


Maybe I'm a bit broken too

by wheres-mickey (peijou)



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bipolar Disorder, Bipolar!Ian, Comfort/Angst, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Post S4, Recreational Drug Use, Slow Burn, Therapy, therapist!mickey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-01
Updated: 2015-06-30
Packaged: 2018-03-21 10:37:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 36,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3689121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peijou/pseuds/wheres-mickey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ian's attending therapy for the third time, and his new therapist is nothing like the other therapists he's ever encountered. (or the summary that has way too many 'therapy' in it)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. session two

**Author's Note:**

> Two years post-S4. Canon-compliant, except for the ixm arc.
> 
> TW: mention/depiction of bipolar disorder

"Ian Gallagher?"

Ian nodded.

"How you feeling?"

"Better. Not so foggy."

"Good."

"Does that mean I can leave now?"

It's hard to say which, between the sharp look and the disbelieving raise of brow his question earned him, cut him off first.

Eventually, his therapist sighed. "Do I have to do this with you every single time?" he asked tiredly, his eyes flickering back on the desk standing between them, covered with documents and forms of all kinds. He flipped through Ian's medical record, eyebrows high. "You signed to be admitted for a four-month therapy trial," he sounded distracted, as though he couldn't care less. "You'll go home once this session is over and you'll come back in two weeks, for next session."

Ian sunk down into his chair, not even bothering to hide his displeasure.

The man – _mickey_ , if the cheap name tag that hung, crooked, on the office door was any indication – shook his head and pushed his thick glasses up the bridge of his nose. Black-framed glasses, Ian noticed. Black. Like his hair, like the shirt he was wearing, and like his gloved hands drumming on the wooden piece of furniture.

Truthfully, if Ian didn't know better, the guy could just pass for a normal therapist. But as a regular, he kind of knew how therapists looked like, how they behaved, and above all, how they made him feel. And this guy definitely had a different vibe. Sitting in a clinic in front of someone whose diploma claimed they knew how to cure people from psychiatric disorder remained an awkward and foreign feeling to Ian (how can you cure something you don't experience?), but the reason for the discomfort with this doctor seemed different.

His last two therapists treated him like he was a broken toy. But this one– this one was not even _treating_ him.

"Okay, see it like this," Mickey carried on, unaware of the dilemma taking place in Ian's brain, "you've already done one session, almost two; only six to go. That's a third. That's not so bad."

Well, that sounded _pretty bad_ to Ian's hears. But he managed not to voice the whiny little whisper inside his head.

The man leaned against the back of his chair and opened two interrogative hands, his eyes inquisitive. "So? Are we actually going to talk this time?"

He certainly wasn't the professional here, yet Ian could tell their first session had been mostly, if not totally, unproductive, therapy-wise. Except for the part where Ian briefly introduced himself, they barely talked at all. Ian stared at his phone the whole time, and the therapist at his computer, not even trying to strike up a conversation– _public therapists_ , Ian had thought, though he hadn't minded that day being out of the center of attention. And wouldn't mind it today either.

"I don't feel like talking."

"It's okay," and as Ian was left wondering if he was talking about him being fine with them not talking or if it was about the whole situation, about Ian's disease, the therapist shifted in his chair and added, somewhat thoughtfully, "not much of a talker myself."

Even though it didn't really matter, because he was happy with the non-talking part either way, Ian abstractedly took note of that. 

Ian, from his part, was not fine. His whole family decided so, at least. They decided that he was so fucked that he needed a therapist, someone who un-fucked-up the fucked-up. Which was fucked up in itself, because if they cared enough to ask, Ian would tell them he's fine. He _is_ fine. (He wondered, if he repeated it enough in his head, if Fiona and the others would trust him when he says it at loud.)

He did not lie, earlier, when he claimed to feel better. He still didn't feel great, but it was the best he'd ever been in months. He'd managed to get through his depression phase without falling into a manic phase either; he kind of just... floated in between. Which he insisted was alright.

But like the stubborn teenager she was growing up to be, Debbie had lectured him for hours regarding long-term solutions, stressing the fact that he was bound to drop again anytime soon if he wasn't going to be a _cooperative and responsible_ adult about it. She had then pointedly insisted that recovery required therapy. None of his siblings had dared to object.

If Ian was to take a stab in the dark, he'd bet it's linked with Monica. Everything always goes back to Monica. To the Fear she instilled into the Gallagher collective mind–the fear that Ian was going to turn into anything like their mother.

He knew better than that. The disease might be the same; but they were still different.

They avoided looking in his eyes now. Save for Liam. His little brother, his ray of sunshine, who would stretch out his little arm and pat his little hand, softly, on his red hair, when they sat around the Gallagher table for diner, every time he thought his older brother looked sad. It helped.

Anyway, he'd been forced to go back to the clinic. And Christ, he _hated_ it.

Inwardly rambling over his family's lack of common sense, Ian focused his attention on the desk's right hand corner as he avoided Mickey's eyes and put up with the annoyingly hypnotic  _poc-poc_ of his gloved fingers hitting the wood.

As he was just becoming familiar with it, the noise suddenly switched for an insistent rustle that had him looking up. The therapist was flipping all his papers around, loud, on his massive desk, a concentrated look plastered on his face.

"These sessions are going to be boring as f– _boring_ , though, if neither of us talk," he mumbled, somewhat more for himself.

And then, something strange happened.

Mickey unexpectedly looked up and glared right back at Ian, catching him by surprise and sending shivers on his fingertips, like an electric shock. When he got his brain to function properly again, Ian realized his jaw had already slightly dropped and he shut it in a bang of teeth. His own eyes remained glued to Mickey's until the eye-contact had him fidgeting; he quickly dropped them to stare at the desk again, thankfully safe of any piercing blue eyes.

Ian couldn't see Mickey anymore, but his mind wouldn't shut up. The first thought being, _fuck_ , since when the fuck are doctors so young? aren't they supposed to study for, like, fifty years before they get a job? not gonna lie, he'd been expecting someone much older. The second, that he kinda wanted to ask the why and the how of it all, but he kinda wanted to stay silent too, and the latter urge being the strongest and safest urge, he kept his mouth shut.

Gradually, he felt the tension in his chest ease off.

He gave up on trying to explain what the _fuck_ just happened exactly, and waited for the therapist to say something. Which took a little while, because Mickey was busy sorting his stuff out, and by the time he was done, the desk's messiness could as well have been caused by an angry beaver cutting down a tree on it. He let out a tiny cry of joy before he shoved a DVD in front of Ian's face, across the desk, half-hiding his glorious smile behind.

Ian focused on the jacket. He almost had to go cross-eyed to read the title, and blinked in surprise when he did. "A gangster movie?"

The doc scowled at the wry tone, offended. "Why, don't like them?" He arched his eyebrows again, in case Ian had not noticed his impressive display of eyebrow skills yet, "don't like, don't watch," he huffed out annoyingly, though the words lacked of heat.

He sat heavily on his chair and watched the computer swallow the disc. A little more manipulating from his part was required before a dramatic music started to fill the silence of the office, and Ian mentally prepared himself for was going to feel like hours of lonely boredom.

But unexpectedly, Mickey shut the machine up by smashing a key. He narrowed his eyes at Ian, and while the latter stared blankly at him, he swiveled the computer round so that it faced the length of the desk, for the both of them to see it.

"This one's great," he offered for all explanation to Ian's mild confusion.

Ian figured the best way to pretend he couldn't care less was to snort, so that's what he did. Mickey didn't pick that out.

A gangster movie probably shouldn't be so surprising, Ian considered then, as he eyed the other man. Mickey had _got_ to be a part of the Mob, somehow. Maybe gangsters need therapists, too. The all-black outfit was bringing Mickey's alarmingly pale, smooth-looking skin out, and he had half a smile hanging on his face. It was kind of unsettling, even if Ian couldn't put his finger on why.

He waited for Mickey to look away and, quick and careful, moved a little bit closer to the screen.

The movie dealt with a bride's kidnapping by, the watcher would assume, the mafia. Or whatever. The nonsense of it all made it hard to follow. The twenty first minutes or so showed the groom looking for her in the city, still wearing his wedding costume, and Ian vaguely identified that as ridiculous.

Both the story and the acting sucked; but listening to the comments his therapist made on the side, Ian could have gone as far as half-conceding the movie was worth watching. Too caught up to care about Ian beside him, Mickey fiercely prompted the characters to act in a specific way, cursed them under his breath as they disobeyed, opposed the artistic decisions, and overall, was being a mess of shouts and movements.

It was like watching a game opposing Team Movie and Team Mickey, except the latter always lost. Ian found himself a little involved, and drifted happily in this B-movie, basking in Mickey's weird geniality. If it weren't for the knock on the office door that shook him back to reality, he might even have forgotten this was a therapy session at all.

"Wait!" Mickey exclaimed after a consequent jerk caused by his surprise. "Shit."

The groom's terrified expression (he had just found the wedding dress of his wife-to-be, sans wife, in a garbage can) froze the moment Mickey pressed pause and got replaced by some medical software. The feet comfortably laid during the movie were thrown out of the desk in record time and the computer was turned back to its previous position as if it had never been moved in the first place.

Yet, despite his effort to smooth down his clothes, Mickey still looked a bit at loss when the door opened a crack for a head to pop in, then revolved entirely to show a curvy little woman on the doorstep. She stared at Mickey for a fair amount of time, a knowing look on her face. Mickey hunched his shoulders and looked away. The obvious awkwardness of the scene was endearing to Ian, or at least would have been if he weren't plied with pharmaceuticals.

If he had to guess, he'd say that the young lady came from India, or Southern Asia maybe. Her pretty tanned face was framed by a curly ring of black, silky hair. Ian would even have asserted she was cute if, well, he wasn't much more attracted to the penis type. Especially the mafia penis type–or maybe that was just a new obsession of his.

She cleared her throat, a hint of cautiousness in her voice as she spoke. "Mickey? Someone's waiting for their session, in the waiting room."

Slightly surprised himself as he looked over at his clock, Mickey nodded his head. "Sure, we're done anyway."

Ian fished for his phone in his pocket to confusedly realize that they had been overstepping the time by at least ten minutes. He stood up in a rush and slipped into his jacket, following the woman outside.

"I expect to see you here again in two weeks, Ian Gallagher," the therapist informed him once the redhead reached for the knob to close the door behind him.

Ian glared up at him one last time before disappearing behind the wooden exit.

He could tell the look didn't look very threatening, or at least he used to do much better with his previous therapists. He found himself suddenly pensive as he walked down the corridor towards the waiting room, where Fiona was waiting for him.

When he met her eye, bright with worry and fatigue, and as she stood up, standing on the tip of her toes to wrap him into a tight hug, all the dedication she had shown through his treatment flew right at him in short flashes of memories; especially of how she never forgot to come with him to the clinic, regardless of her work, for two years, even as he quit therapy twice.

Maybe it was time he made her happy in return, he thought quietly. Maybe it was time he tried to get better.

Maybe he should give Mickey a chance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I must warn you, this multichap is the longest English story I've ever written. As a non-native speaker who doesn't have a beta, some mistakes inevitably escape my notice--I'm very sorry. Please go easy on me, I'm honestly trying my best. And of course, feel free to point out any mistakes!
> 
> Feedback is literally the BEST! thing I could ask for, so thank you lots if you find the time to drop by the comment section. You can always [come say hi](http://wheres-mickey.tumblr.com) if you feel like it!


	2. session three

"So you're obviously not going to talk today either," Mickey sighed.

The therapist watched him across the desk with his eyes full of expectation, as though Ian would turn into an old man ready to rant about the increase in the price of potatoes or something. Much to his probable disappointment, the redhead just groaned, retreating into a stubborn silence he found much more comforting. His only interest consisted in stretching this silence into a longer one.

Not that it had always been like this.

In primary school, Ian correctly embodied the human version of happiness.

Over the layer of dense freckles that covered his soft skin, two red circles would color his cheeks healthily, and his infectious smile would brighten anyone's mood within seconds. Him and Lip would find any excuse to escape Fiona's vigilance, fancying the company of threatening-looking neighbors rather than their loneliness at home. He loved babbling, giggled about everything, and some days, the silly things he did (playing pranks on his brothers being his favorite) would worn him out so quickly he'd fall asleep right in the street, where his panicked sister would find him and drag him back home, but not without a good scold.

Times could be harsh, especially with Frank and Monica at home, but somehow they managed to stick together and turn their everyday miseries into some kind of adventure. Milk was missing? A quest was launched to go grab a bottle in the neighbor's fridge. Frank made Debbie cry? Ian deployed all his energy to make her laugh again and kissed her goodnight on the forehead.

But as they grew up, the Gallagher household proved to be too much of a turmoil to keep paying attention to this lively Ian when he came to the age when he could take care of himself. It didn't prevent Ian's insecurities, as any teenager's, to grow exponentially over this period of time.

Junior high went rather fine, but things got more complicated as Ian stepped into high school. It took a handjob from Roger Spikey to make him realize that he didn't exactly fit in, sexually-, and then mentally-speaking. Since his younger siblings hardly talked to him because of the age gap and Fiona struggled to make ends meet, he decided to share his doubts with his brother. All he got from Lip was a dismissive, not to say hostile answer, that got him to flat out leave personal things off his conversations.

So Ian settled in this Quite Middle Child status, because he didn't have much choice, did he. In the end, he went from being the talker to being the listener; because that was all he was then, a careful ear attentive to other people's needs, while his mouth remained sealed.

Fog ensued somewhere near this point. His bursts of joy didn't seem genuine anymore, and it became easier for him to sink into that weird space that had him crawl in his bed all day long. Those phases lasted for days, then weeks.

It didn't take a genius to figure it all out. The Gallaghers had witnessed enough of Monica's mood swings to understand exactly what kind of disorder Ian might share with their mother. And unsurprisingly, his family went straight from not giving a shit to giving one million shits and a half the moment he was diagnosed.

The attention made Ian feel sick to the stomach. He didn't like being the center of attention, and most of all, he didn't like the look of concern his siblings shared, the words Carl whispered to Lip late in their bedroom when they thought Ian slept.

They would try to make him talk, make him take his medication, go to therapy, still wake up, stay focused, _keep trying_ to the point where Ian couldn't take it anymore. He ran away for a week in an abandoned house in Chicago's periphery, where he was eventually found by the police and brought back home.

He dropped out of therapy once more after that, because he just couldn't see any point in it at all.

Ian built a relative security for himself. He assumed he'd be better off accepting the fact that he'd stay bipolar forever than expecting his 'normal' life back. It wasn't all that bad, when he was manic. He felt like he could do anything.

The siblings sensed that, and kept pretending there was a way out. Debbie wanted him back in therapy, albeit it would be his third time, because where they continually failed, she hoped therapy would succeed. The same circle only repeated itself all over again, really.

Except Mickey was a new unknown factor in the equation.

The fact that the only person interested enough to listen to Ian's problems had to be someone paid for it, firstly, certainly didn't help his trust issues, and secondly, proved that his family only moved the problem away. Because, out of all the people, why Mickey, who looked like miles away from being a good listener, would sit down and listen to Ian talk for an hour?

Ian was torn between the need to please his family and the urge to run away to yet another place where he could live his bipolar life in peace. Honestly, he'd even thought about getting back in touch with his mother.

Truthfully though, he wasn't half as mad as he'd been during his first visit to the clinic. His silence was a method not to lie, because he knew his probability to lie instantly rose to an ugly level as soon as he'd open his mouth. Silences, on the other hand, didn't lie; none of his promises about trying to get better could be compromised as he kept his mouth shut.

But while he could lie to everyone else, he still couldn't lie to himself and per se, he knew therapy had occupied his mind for the past two weeks. Mickey did. Because Ian still couldn't explain what he'd felt when Mickey had looked at him. It was foreign in comparison with all the blur that had constituted his last year on the pills.

"I wasn't sure you'd show up," Mickey admitted just as though he could read Ian's mind and that had him jerking in his chair in surprise. "I'm glad you came," Mickey added earnestly when Ian finally looked up at him.

That simple sentence left Ian with a flip of his stomach and little butterflies in his belly.

Oh. That was it. The one thing Ian couldn't explain. _The butterflies_. He hadn't had those in months, years maybe– since Kash? Ian honestly couldn't tell. But they were indeed there, albeit teeny-weeny, is his stomach, which left Ian wondering if that meant he was attracted to his therapist.

That would be fucking stupid move, because although he didn't have such thing as a type, if he did he probably wouldn't pick the mafia type that could burst his skull in a snap of a finger.

Ian focused back on the office's whitish wallpaper, then on his therapist, and got suddenly afraid that if he opened his mouth he would blurt out something stupid, like admit to Mickey that his eyes were making him feel uncomfortable because they were the most beautiful, bright blue orbs he'd ever seen.

Yet, there was no way he could say something like that. So instead of voicing all of that lame gay crap and get his head exploded the moment he stepped one foot outside, he gathered his courage and huffed "Stop staring"–as if he weren't doing just that.

"I'm not," Mickey answered quickly as he looked away, dragging his eyebrows to the center of his face in a motion Ian privately found cute and almost wanted to smack himself in the face for that.

But the therapist seemed content enough to have dragged a sound out of Ian's mouth. He looked down at the pen he absentmindedly toyed with since the beginning of the session and his face unexpectedly lit up. "How do you feel about drawing?"

Uh, awful. "What about the movie from last time?"

The doc heaved a sigh. "I wish we could finish it, too. But Richa confiscated it from me." Ian had to guess Richa was the tanned young lady from last time. She smiled at both him and Fiona the moment she saw them coming in, "actually, she confiscated all of my movies. Said it wasn't professional, or whatever."

That made Ian snort. "No shit."

"So, drawing?" the doc asked, ignoring the attitude.

"I'm not a six years-old," Ian replied, and he knew it was puerile and childish, but he didn't want to cooperate.

Mickey pushed his papers to the side, making room on the desk. "Me neither, but I draw like a champ. You know who else drew like a champ? Leonardo Di Caprio."

"Da Vinci," Ian corrected with an incredulous raise of his eyebrows. "That wouldn't have won you any Oscar either."

"Yeah, whatever." Mickey waved a dismissive hand at that. "He was not a six years-old. Except when he was, y'know, young, but I'm talking about when he was making sketches and all. He was older then, right?" He paused, as if some realization had opened up new artistic horizons as it downed upon him. "Shit, maybe he wasn't. Isn't it Chopin, or whoever, who played like a whole orchestra at, like, three?" He scratched his nose, thoughtful. "Geniuses."

The guy talked kind of a lot, for a self-proclaimed non-talker. Ian rolled his eyes, didn't even hide it. "I don't draw."

"You're not going to talk, and I'm not going to pull the words out of your mouth," Mickey said with a shrug, like forcing Ian was not even an option–and Jesus Christ, Ian felt a wave of relief overwhelm him at those simple words.

He was having enough of Debbie as his younger sister tried to make him spit whatever she wanted to hear out of his mouth, and he had had more than enough of his previous therapists, almost dropping to their knees so he told them the things they wanted him to say. He winced in awkward gratitude because that's all he managed to do, but that earned him a quick smile from Mickey that warmed his chest–again.

"You might as well try to do something with these sessions and not just sit here and do nothing for an hour. Besides, drawing is fun." Mickey motioned towards a stack of sheets and picked up a pen as he showed his forms with his other hand. "I'll just deal with the paperwork meanwhile."

Ian didn't how he was supposed to react. Having someone giving up on making him talk but still managing to show some sort of support, as fucked up as that sounded, composed a whole new thing to him he had yet to discover.

Sensing his hesitation, Mickey glanced at him through his lashes. "Just give it a try," he sighed. And like the stubborn shit Ian had noticed he could be when he had something in mind, Mickey handed the paper and the pen over, "you don't have to make it look good. Most things are ugly in life anyway."

Before Ian could decide whether he could trust Mickey and let him have the last word, his hand reached for the items, brushing Mickey's gloved hands as he did so.

Mickey was smiling as Ian's eyes fell back on the paper, on which he drew a single line. The end of this line got reached by a new line at the bottom, and soon enough, Ian was drawing a bunch of lines, some of them intertwining together, some others very separate from one another. He kept doing that for a while. He kept doing it until a hand wrapped his arm, squeezing his biceps firmly, and he heard a voice somewhere near his face. "–me?"

Ian tried to focus on this rough, yet warm somehow, voice.

"Hey, do you hear me?"

Ian yanked his head up and opened two wide eyes. Mickey mirrored him. He had stood up from his chair and was leaning into Ian's space, tilting his head to snatch a glimpse of his patient. His warm breath was hitting Ian's skin, his hand was squeezing harder and suddenly, Ian wanted to do all those things to him too, his thighs lifting him, without his consent, to get closer. 

But Mickey closed his eyes shut when he received a response and huffed out a weak laugh. " _Shit_ , you were not answering. I thought you were gone," he whispered, as he lowered himself into his chair again, making Ian shiver as let go of his arm.

There was disappointed, but also, Mickey's sigh of relief warmed Ian's chest in spite of himself. It felt good to have someone who cared about him without the downside of having to explain them things Ian himself couldn't explain. Like how and why he had been forgetting himself. Mickey knew how to do that, no matter what the first impressions told.

Ian's mild shock at the doc's swearing vanished as soon as he glanced back to his sheet. He sent a questioning look towards Mickey, but the therapist seemed just as surprised as Ian was. He picked it up and his eyes darted between Ian and the piece of paper.

The bunch of lines had turned into a huge doodle of squared forms which meaning, if there was any, remained completely unknown to Ian.

"Abstract artist, huh? Not bad," Mickey finally said, and Ian's lip curled up at the praise. It faded away pretty quickly, though, as his eyes fell back at staring their usual spot on the desk, playing with the pen still hanging uselessly in his hand, until Mickey's voice made him look up again.

"So what do you like?"

"Dick," Ian answered without missing a beat, though he wasn't sure what Mickey had meant exactly in 'liking'; if it was what he liked in the activity of drawing in general, what he liked in abstract art that had made him draw some, or what he liked to have in his mouth to suck on–the broad question had of course Ian picking the last and most believable hypothesis of them.

He wished, with a certain lack of maturity and a playful hint in his voice that he hadn't heard coming out of his own mouth for what felt ages, he wished to trigger some reaction from the doc.

He looked up testily, but the other man just glared at him, unimpressed.

"Come on. Think of something."

That confused Ian until, _oh_ , he realized Mickey must have understood it wrong. Ian meant dick in like _dick_ dick not _nothing_ dick.

He did like dick, and now that he thought about it, maybe he was curious about Mickey's.

Maybe.

Maybe that was slightly fucked up that Ian was thinking about his therapist's dick, or that he was disappointed that said therapist didn't pick up the hint (or thankful that he didn't, he wasn't sure about that either). Either way, he tried to cover up the misunderstanding quickly, "I don't know, I like cats, dogs... Animals in general."

"Okay." The therapist took one paper out of the stack and a pen from his mug before glancing at Ian once again with a flash of challenge in his eyes. "I like beer. You draw a bottle of beer; I draw your happy-puppy family shit."

Ian picked up his own pen and started to draw.

It was fucked. It was fucked that Ian was enjoying this. This whatever going on between the two of them. But Ian and Mickey didn't have to talk and Mickey didn't give a shit about him being a broken, didn't treat him as so. Didn't make him _feel_ like he was--unlike the previous therapists, unlike his whole family.

He was just here, willing to listen but willing to let Ian have it his way, if that was what he wanted.

Maybe Ian sent a few glances Mickey's way while he was drawing his stupid bottle of beer, wishing the idiot did just the same when Ian stared back at his sheet.

When he stepped out of his third session, without any drawing in hand because Mickey argued that he wasn't done, like a bloody teenager going through puberty, Ian felt oddly light-hearted. And not in a sick-to-the-stomach way, in a good way.

Fiona's worried look when she stood up from her plastic chair in the waiting room didn't even manage to crush his good mood. The smile he shared was almost genuine, and her own rewarded him right after that. They hugged each other under the kind look of Richa, typing on her computer on the other side of the room.

Ian felt light-headed for the whole ride home, and somehow, thought it had something to do with Mickey.

He couldn't help but be curious about the man, about what he had managed to pull out of Ian, the grimaces that were nearly smiles and the small, stupid sparks in his stomach. It had only been three sessions and although they barely spoke, Ian felt already more alive.

He collapsed onto his tiny bed, once at home.

He wanted to feel again. To taste life, live it at its fullest, have bursts of joy climbing up his chest and anticipation shaking his knees when it came to Mickey. No more blur, nothing but vivid feelings. What seemed to prevent him from reaching out for his own happiness, though, also happened to be what enabled him to stay the tiniest bit stable. The math was easy: keep surviving _or_ try and living. The first was safe, the second, risky at best, lethal at worst.

So Ian didn't weigh his options any further–he just got rid of his pills.


	3. session four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: depiction of a manic phase (in like every other chapter, but y'know, better safe than sorry)

The two following weeks turned out to be eventful, to say the least.

Ian stopped taking his medication the very night of his third therapy session; gave up on pretending he still was as soon as he realized that nobody checked on him. The first few days off the pills, though, happened to be rough on his body; his sore limbs had him lying in his bed for forty-eight hours straight even as his headaches prevented him from getting any sleep.

Nevertheless, at some point, his body acclimated. He wandered aimlessly in every corner of the house because his migraines still wouldn't let him sleep or even think properly until, eventually, they died down too.

By the end of the week, even during his semi-conscious state, he had been witnessing enough of Liam's cute babbles, whether with Lip during his short visits at the house while his older brother tried to get some homework done or with Fiona while she packed Debbie and Carl's lunches, to decide that he wanted to be a part of the family again.

An active member that is. Not a ghost. The member he used to be; a brother on whom Liam and the others could count.

He needed to quit the moping and start spending more time with his siblings.

 

***

 

On Sunday, Ian woke up at six to an unexpected morning wood.

He took his sweet time in the bathroom. It felt oddly nice to have his libido again.

He savored every moment of it; from the cold touch of his out-of-practice hand to the hot, overwhelming wave of pleasure that spread into his whole body up to the tip of his eyelashes as he came hard on the floor. Light-headed, he cleaned his mess before heading, all smiley, to the kitchen to make the five of them breakfast--Lip was still stuck at college doing some group work or whatever.

When everyone finally stirred up, Fiona went downstairs first. She jerked, mouth and eyes wide open in surprise as she took sight of her younger brother standing behind the hot plates, busy cooking pancakes.

Instantly worried by the mood swing between the last time she saw him and now, she crowded his space, risking a hand on his shoulder. "You okay there, buddy?" she asked.

Ian spun round, waving his spatula in the air, only to notice the dark circles around Fiona's eyes and her pale, sickly-looking skin. "Are you?" he responded, glancing at her with an amused frown that made her smile tightly.

"Yeah, I guess. It's just, you know. The usual." Eyebrow high, she landed a tired hand in her hair, eyes focusing on some imaginary point, and sighed pointedly as Ian flipped the pancakes in the pan. "We're running short of staff at the diner so working there is kind of exhausting lately."

"How can you be running short of staff when there are dozens of people, starting from your little brother right there, who are looking for a job?"

She opened her mouth to defend herself from Ian's not-so-veiled accusation, only to be interrupted by Carl and Debbie as the two teenagers dashed down the stairs, yelling something about heaven smell and pushing each other so they could get there first. Fiona hurried toward them, trying to get them to settle.

"Ian!" chanted Liam as he quietly entered the kitchen last. He was dragging a stuffed bunny with one hand and rubbing his eyes with one fist.

"Liam!" Ian replied, mimicking his little brother's voice in a way that made him giggling.

Plates in hand, they all settled noisily around the Gallagher table. Burst of joy exploded in Ian's chest as the whole family (save for Lip and Frank–but does the latter even count) was gathered around him. He had missed them so much. Though he had stood right there a few days ago, only now was he both mentally and physically present.

Family was his everything, and he intended on protecting this everything.

Ian idly listened to the argument that had started between his siblings as Carl tried stealing Debbie's bacon. The latter never failed to surprise them all with her strength, and true to her reputation, she kicked Carl in the calf hard enough to shut him up for the moment and shoved a mouthful of egg down her throat.

Sticking her fork enthusiastically into her retrieved bacon, she started talking, as dynamic nods punctuated her words, "I'm happy to see you're participating so actively in your treatment, Ian."

"Especially if that gives us fresh pancakes every morning," Carl added with a smirk before Fiona smacked him upside the head and gave Ian an apologetic yet fond look.

"We're all glad to see you're better, Ian," she announced earnestly.

"See?" Debbie swallowed the rest of her egg, pointing an accusatory fork at Ian. "That's a good thing you started taking therapy seriously."

She basically took all the credits for his recovery, Ian noted. He let her, smiling instead. "Thanks for the support, guys," he allowed and Liam offered him a megawatt smile that he knew would fuel him for the rest of the day.

Carl burped, interrupting their moment, and resumed stealing Debbie's food despite her vigorous protests while Fiona vainly tried to get the two of them to _calm down, jesus, you're not ten anymore_.

Ian didn't mind the bickers, really; it sounded like a warm lullaby to his hears.

 

***

 

On Monday, Ian decided to go for a jog. Because, why the fuck not.

After a few minutes, he noticed people looking over at him. That spooked him out, until he remembered that they weren't doing so because he looked like a psycho coming out from a mental ward, like a few weeks ago, but simply because he was a fast runner. Yes, he could do a normal thing like that. He could run, and he was pretty fucking good at it too.

How bad hadn't he missed being good at something.

The breath of wind brushed on his face as he ran. It freed him of any constraints, if only for a moment.

When he came back home, all sweaty and happy, his muscles ached in a way he knew would to remain for hours, and he loved the feeling of it all.

Ian was doing better with his family. He could run wherever he wanted. His life was back on track. He was in control.

Living was a fucking bliss.

 

***

 

On Wednesday, as he was busy cleaning the mess of their living-room, Ian suddenly realized how quiet the house had been all afternoon, meaning that all of his siblings had left to God-knows-where.

He took it as his cue to slip on the tightest jeans he could find and a nice shirt, and took off to Boystown without even rethinking it. It had been awhile, five months maybe, since he last had at the very least a handjob, and it was about time he got back on track.

He missed having sex, he missed not even _wanting_ to have sex. Fucking was another thing he was good at, from what he recalled.

Wednesday meant therapy day once every two weeks, but this week was an off week. Ian found himself oddly upset about that, hence as well the need for a good fuck to get his head straight.

Of course, Wednesday also meant that the crowd gathered in the Fairy Tale was very little compared to a weekend's night. But it had its advantages too since most of the people willing to dance on a weekday were the horny ones; which made things easier as far as Ian's plans to find a fuck were concerned.

It indeed didn't take long. After fifteen minutes of sipping his beer at the bar, Ian spotted a decent random with a fancy leather jacket–his ass, mostly, looked nice.

As it turned out, Ian's predictions weren't far from the truth; five minutes of grinding all together got them straight to the men's room, where Ian went directly for what he'd come for, not bothering with foreplay, and it could honestly have been a great fuck if the guy hadn't been way too noisy for Ian's liking.

They didn't exchange numbers or anything when they parted. Ian simply got out of the club, a small taste of disappointment remaining on his tongue.

On his walk home, he found himself replaying the scene from earlier, except it wasn't Leather Jacket under him, but –and the thought confused him at first– Mickey. He imagined Mickey, loud and bossy, bent over the sink. Gasping and letting Ian pound into him.

Funny how that was arousing.

Suddenly very curious about the whole idea, Ian hurried to the Gallagher house. Once he checked that everyone was sound asleep, he headed for the bathroom, locking the door just to be sure.

Cock in hand, he imagined Mickey's mouth around him as he started stroking himself slowly.

He suddenly wondered whether Mickey was any good. He had got to be; anyone that blasé had _got_ to be wild in bed.

He would have a warm, wet mouth bobbing his dick up and down. Mickey would keep eye-contact even as he knelt so that Ian could keep staring into his blue eyes while the dark-haired man swallowed him.

And Ian would run his hand in said hair to drink into his sight best because that was just how pretty Mickey looked.

The pace had quicken exponentially as his needs inevitably got the upper hand. Biting down on his bottom lip to keep his mouth shut, he pictured Mickey grabbing his hips so as to drink him more easily, hair messy and face flushed, and didn't have time to bite back his cry of pleasure.

His vision turned black the moment he climaxed and the orgasm was intense enough to have him holding on the edge of the sink not to wobble.

His heart was beating so fast it threatened to break his rib cage. Breathless, he looked over at his reflection in the mirror. He looked wrecked, but his smile was genuine.

 

***

 

Turned out, Ian was already worn out by his recurring jerking out sessions by Saturday and craved to be touched by someone, anyone. What better else to do, then, than go to Boystown? that's what he did.

The choice was a lot more interesting since broader than three nights before. Ian set his sights on some brunet who didn't look anything like Mickey but they had a similar size so Ian figured it wouldn't matter once he was bent over.

Ian made sure to keep one hand in the guy's hair the whole time, just like he wished he could do with Mickey, and trailed kisses down his neck occasionally, which, honestly, he wished he could do with Mickey too. Thankfully, the guy happened to be a silent one, so it didn't trouble Ian in picturing the sounds Mickey would make if it were him instead--the mere thought aroused him, really.

Ian's dick seemed to think so, too. The rapidity with which he came was almost pathetic.

 

***

 

Waiting for Wednesday was the weirdest torture Ian had ever experienced.

All of his thoughts were directed towards Mickey. Mickey's eyes, Mickey's hands; he realized he had yet to Mickey's ass but was left wondering about it nonetheless.

Fiona offered him to help with her shifts at the diner, after his smartass comment in the kitchen a few days ago. He couldn't be happier to find a way to keep his mind busy. In the end, he still had to excuse himself to the employee's bathroom at least twice a day to jerk off there.

He knew he couldn't keep up if he didn't want to be found drowned in his own jizz.

But finally, fucking finally, Wednesday came. (Ian too, before he headed for the office, just so he wasn't nervous.)

It was only half past two, albeit his session started at three, when Ian walked in the small office hall for his fourth session. He had set such a quick walking pace -honestly a lot closer to jogging than actually walking- that he got much earlier than necessary, which simple showed how incredibly eager he was to see Mickey.

The stupid doodle he drew with Mickey last time, stapled on the board behind Richa's desk, welcomed him as he checked himself in to the secretary. Even though it was half-covered with information brochures and medical posters, it remained clearly visible for all the patients since Richa's desk constituted a gateway to Mickey's office.

Ian apparently didn't mind stupid because he felt unabashedly proud to see it here (hanged by Mickey, Ian assumed, since the therapist last had it), where everyone could notice it. His grin got suddenly so broad his face started to hurt.

Richa greeted him with a smile, which he returned easily since it only required him to duck his already smiling face a few inches down. One of her eye twitched when she noticed there wasn't anyone with him.

"You look great, Ian," she said gently as she invited him in the waiting room.

He nodded and followed her, settling obediently in one of the chairs to wait his turn.

He came alone indeed. Fiona and him had come to an agreement the day before: he could go on his own provided that he called her beforehand and afterwards–or at any time if he needed anything. Ian gave her his word. He wouldn't need anything anymore.

He was invincible, now.

Instead of the constant fog he had be living in since he started his treatment, he was now very conscious of all the things happening; of all the noises surrounding him–the cars outside, the steady _clack clack_ of Richa's typing next door, even his heartbeat.

As to prove it to himself once more, he clenched his fists to _feel_ the slight pain caused by his nails digging into the flesh of his palms. He ran a hand on the covers of the magazines that were set on the coffee table in the waiting room to _feel_ the tip of his fingers brushing against the glassy paper, to _feel_ the pictures' bright colors printing up on his retina, and everything felt so _real_. It was beautiful.

Since he had been deprived of energy for so long, maybe just getting back to normal made everything look so damn great. Like leaving an ugly, hazy dream behind.

Or maybe that was just how people, free of any medication that turned everything into fog, always felt like. Ian didn't know anymore; he'd forgotten how it felt like not to wake up at six every morning to swallow half a dozen pills.

All he wanted for now, was for this taste of freedom to last forever because he never felt that free in ages.

Actually, therapy had done quite the opposite of what it was supposed to do, Ian pondered with an amused snort as he looked over to the clock.

Fifteen more minutes.

His family had got him to believe that his treatment would help get back to stability. Stability, his ass.

Now that he was no longer in the grip of his meds, Ian was literally vibrating with energy. Didn't he make it up with his siblings? Got his life back on track? He could grab life with both hands, do whatever he wanted. The possibilities seemed endless. Who wants stability when you can have _invincibility_?

Idly, he figured Mickey would be just as hot as he remembered him to be, all serious and mafia-like behind his desk. He would still be drumming his gloved hands on the wood. Hands about which Ian had fantasized so fucking much about for the last two weeks, which he wished were on him at all times.

He knew he'd better be fantasizing, though. Because there was no way he could actually have Mickey in his bed. He was horny, not delusional.

Anyway, as the clock finally decided to move its pointy ass to reached three, Ian slipped into the office for his long-awaited fourth session.

The first thing he saw was Mickey's grin, and oh boy, wasn't that grin just goddamn wonderful. So Ian beamed back, and that had Mickey narrow his eyes, slightly confused. Ian ignored that and settled on one of the two plastic chairs facing the desk. He crossed his legs and eyed the other man intently.

"Hey," he said, his crooked smile still floating somewhere on his face.

"Hey," Mickey replied cautiously, "How you feeling?"

"I'm okay."

The therapist's nodded absently and shifted his attention back to his papers. "How do you feel about talking to me today?"

No matter the whole I-feel-better thing, Ian remained uncertain about the talking shit. He shifted his weight on the chair a few times before he figured that showing even the tiniest bit of cooperation could get Mickey to look at him, so he gave in and attempted to cooperate. "What is this thing anyway?"

"What thing?"

"The thing we're doing."

" _Oh._ " Mickey fell back against the back of his chair and rubbed a tired hand over his face, as if he wished he could avoid this boring talk. "They call it therapy. I call it _babbling_ ," he said unconvincingly.

Ian jutted his chin. "If it's just babbling, I can do that on my own," he snapped.

If he had expected to trigger some kind of anger or exasperation out of his doc with the attitude, he certainly was disappointed. Mickey only tilted his head to the side as he narrowed his eyes, watching him curiously.

"Sure. Go on."

It took a while for Ian to process that. "I don't get it," he finally replied, and hated how uncertain and croaky his voice sounded even to his own ears.

Mickey pointed one gloved finger at him. "You can babble on your own, can't you? Go on, then. I'm not here." Mickey eyed him expectantly, and obviously, didn't take no as an answer because interrupted Ian before he could retort, adding easily, somewhat like an encouragement, "You just talk about yourself. Whatever pops to your head."

"There's nothing in my head."

Ian bit his lip at the admission, only a little too late. Mickey, though, didn't seem nearly as emotional.

"Bullshit," he scoffed, "Your head is full of stuff. Truth is, it's so full of stuff that you don't even know where to start. We're sorting those things out right now." His eyes went soft, as if Ian weren't confused enough already. "Come on."

Sure, Ian felt weird about talking. But maybe he could try? Mickey hadn't been super annoying about it so far. Kinda mad that Mickey managed to pull words out of his mouth, he also realized that it had been way too long since he last had a talk with someone that wasn't bipolar-related.

It was all it took for him to figure that, _hell_ , no need to be hesitant. He could do that.

So he opened his mouth, closed it. Opened it again, and finally settled for something he considered wasn't too personal. "I like to work out?" It wasn't a question, but somehow it came out like one. It made Ian cringe inwardly.

"Can see that," Mickey said, and Ian could have sworn he saw a smirk. He forgot his own embarrassment as his own lips curled into a grin.

"Yeah?"

"Would be easier to say without the shirt but I figured," Mickey continued and his eyes trailed down Ian's shirt.

Ian gaped. Was Mickey being flirty on him? Was there a chance that-- "I can take it off if you want," he suggested right away, not even caring about sounding too eager. Oh shit _yes_ he could strip right now.

"Come down, tiger," Mickey replied with a laugh as he shook two surrendering hands in mid-air, "we wanna keep this session PG."

Ian squirmed in his chair. PG meant room for flexibility.

He didn't want to look too desperate so he let go of the issue with the firm intention of getting back to it some other time. Preferably soon.

"Well you'd have seen it's not as stacked as it used to be," he carried on instead. Not that Mickey ever knew how stacked it used to be, but Ian was willing to show him once he was back into shape. Or maybe they could train together. In his bedroom. Naked.

Mickey interrupted him in his thoughts, himself pensive. "Why is that?"

"I only got back to it a few days ago," Ian responded with a shrug.

"Why just a few days ago?"

"Didn't feel like it before I guess?"

The doc furrowed his eyebrows, still staring intently at him. "You do now?"

"Yup. I'm totally up for it."

"Means your meds are balanced and all that?"

Ian looked away. Mickey noticed. "Guess so, yeah."

Frowning even harder, Mickey pushed the issue even as Ian was fidgeting in obvious discomfort before him. "So before that, what did you do?"

Ian contemplated on ignoring him, but Mickey, without saying or doing anything, did that weird thing again, that thing that made Ian want to open up. Reluctantly, he offered a small, way too personal for his own liking, piece of information. "Nothing. I don't feel like doing anything when I'm like that."

"So you don't wake up?"

"Yeah, why?" Ian asked abruptly, shaking his head in disbelieve. "Why do you have to make a thing out of it?"

Mickey winced a bit, and said slowly, "Because your current condition could be linked with the disease, Ian."

It was like the air had been sucked out of the room. Ian felt his entire mood shift at this sentence.

Of fucking course, Mickey had to be a stubborn shit unable to drop the fucking issue. It had to go back to the disorder, to Ian's inability to fight it on his own, to his meds. He couldn't just be fine on his own.

He wanted to run, run away to spare himself from yet another worried look, but he stayed stuck to his chair.

"Whatever, man," he grunted harshly, a little surprised by the familiarity as he says it but mostly too pissed off to take it off. Mickey didn't bother to pick it up anyway.

He eyed Ian silently for a fair amount of time. Ian consciously avoided looking anywhere near Mickey, but even so, it was as if he _felt_ the flash of concern that lit up his eyes.

When he spoke again, Mickey seemed to be pick his words with the maximum of possible cautiousness, as if he didn't want to hurt Ian; or, Ian wasn't sure, as if he wasn't even sure himself of what he was saying.

"Maybe you could set up an alarm, for times when you don't feel like waking up? So that you still feel like you have to. Then maybe you can force, sort of, yourself to do daily things, like write in a notebook, or go for a run. Set up a routine. Even if it's not much. It'd keep you busy. Besides," his voice went so soft that Ian felt his insides twist, his certainties crumble, "I'd like to know you're awaken."

Scoffing, Ian managed to spit, "like you give a shit."

Mickey's face turned instantly hard at that; it would have unnerved Ian if he weren't so mad already. They stared aggressively at each other.

Ian's chest tightened painfully the longer the silence stretched. Shit, he used to be so good with those.

"Whatever," Mickey finally mumbled, breaking eye contact. "I don't."

Yeah, whatever, Ian thought. There was no point in staying if he wasn't going to talk.

Without much thinking, he gathered his jacket, stood up and made his way towards the door, even though there was at least thirty minutes left into the session. Mickey didn't stop him, and Ian was glad he didn't because it would have ended with a fist in his annoyingly good-looking, stupid face. He paid zero attention to Richa when she dashed towards him, wary, and tried to grab his arm.

Pressure was pounding in his head when he reached the street. The air was fresh against his skin, but he could feel it burning, and everything seemed blurred all over again.

Suddenly, Mickey had seemed to care. He had The Look in his eyes. Ian knew that look all too well. And that meant that the only human being with whom he could do whatever he wanted without feeling judged, suddenly gave a shit. Mickey was, actually, just like everyone else.

So if anything, Ian was disappointed.

And hurt, when he thought about the way Mickey's eyes were somehow yelling _and fuck you too_ right before he left, and how Mickey probably would've said it out loud if he weren't his therapist.

His skin was itching. The air he breathed burned his throat. He started running down the street in the opposite direction of his house, desperately looking for the aching relief his body offered when it was pushed to its limit--just like when he goes for a proper run.

But the relief wasn't coming. The only sound he could hear over the pounding of his heart and his labored breaths was a voice taunting him, repeating the same three words over and over in his head.

 _Whatever_ , it said. _I don't._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you'd like to know more about how this story was documented (though this is a strong word), you might want to read [this](http://wheres-mickey.tumblr.com/post/116015778900).
> 
> PS: I do believe in happy endings! don't worry, it does get better, I swear!


	4. session five halved

Nick Straits was the happy owner of two dogs and a single-story house in Central Chicago, in which he lived with his wife and their daughter.

Sadly for Nick, he also owed Terry Milkovich a shit-ton of money. And Terry Milkovich wasn't exactly the soft type of man to just let it slide when it came to money.

So when the payments started to get late and low, Terry broke into Nick's house. He just targeted the windows at first, but then, it was also Nick's nice Mercedes car's turn to be keyed or his fancy furniture to be stolen or ruined in turn, and Terry maintained this little circle of demolition until the poor guy fell to his knees, begging Terry to leave him and his family alone.

"I'll do whatever you want," he blurted out of desperation.

"Whatever?" Terry had asked roughly.

Nick had nodded his head so frenetically it could have dropped on the floor.

Terry pondered on whether the satisfaction to burst Nick's bold head was worth getting into some trouble with the cops, only to remember, just in time, that he already ran into enough of them recently, and that he was running short of money now that the police were keeping a watch on his every movements, making his usual scams a lot harder to run.

Sparing Nick's bold head could be a mean to get out of financial trouble.

So all things considered, Terry grunted, "give my sons a job."

It was a little too late to take it back and he couldn't see a better way out of it anyway, so Nick had agreed and given his own job away.

If it weren't for the income Nick clarified earning, Terry would have argued loud and clear the moment he learnt he was a civil servant that his sons  _weren't no state kiss asses_ , and that he certainly wasn't the one to force them to become so.

But the paycheck got him convinced, somehow.

The point of it all was that it allowed a Milkovich to sit on his ass all day long playing therapist while still earning more money than he would risking said ass running drug operations.

They wouldn't have an health insurance, but got all the other advantages that came with a job--fixed schedules and the certainty of having an actual paycheck at the end of the month, for starters. As long as they were not found out, it would keep the feds off their asses, too.

It was edging a lot closer to the illegal side than anything else, but it gave them the illusion of making legit money. If they wanted to, they could still run their usual, family-bonding scams on the side. Accepting the job was a win-win deal, really. So Terry figured, what the hell. They could do this. They could have the system conned  _and_ diddle money out of it.

So one day, Terry barged in Mickey's room and eyed the startled kid up and down.

He asked, "You know therapy?" and the question left Mickey at sea--for an overwhelming moment, he even thought his father wanted him confined for no apparent reason. But Terry cut him short before he could panic, "You'll fucking learn, 'cause you're taking the job," he said, and dumped him there to get back to his former business, namely, go take a piss.

Mickey knew about the whole Nick mess and how the guy repaid his debts by giving his father his job, but had no clue about the job in itself.

He decided to rethink his father's words with the sweet company of alcohol within his blood. But as he went to the kitchen with the firm intention to grab a beer, he found his brothers lazing in the couch. Glum and morose, they were watching some sports program airing on the TV.

Mickey couldn't exactly pretend he hadn't seen them when they were right all over the fucking place, so he stepped closer once he had his beer in hand and half of his content already down his throat. "Dad wants me. For the job," he said after a loud burp.

Nobody bothered to look up. Since he obviously waited for some sort of answer, Joey eventually glanced tiredly at him. "Yeah, we know."

"You guys okay with this?" Mickey pressed. He remembered how excited they had been when they had heard about the possibility of getting an actual, _paid_ job. Since the nature of the job remained unknown, the brothers' guess had settled on Colin because he was the oldest and the most versatile out of the brothers.

Eyes still glued on the TV, Iggy shook his head. "Yeah? heard it's therapy or some shit." He scoffed. "Good luck with that."

"Yeah, well. I don't really know what that means," Mickey admitted lowly, settling awkwardly on the floor next to the coffee table.

"Means you'll have to deal with mental cases. Nutjobs," Joey explained flatly. "So no, we're not jealous."

Iggy sighed. "S'not like like dad could've taken any of us," he added, and kicked Mickey hard in the thigh. "You've always been the smartest one."

Mickey swatted his brother's foot away. "I know fuck-all about therapy," he argued, equally embarrassed and annoyed, as he rubbed his thigh resentfully.

"Jesus fuck, Mickey, you'll manage," Colin grunted, seemingly done with the conversation even though it had just started, "Bring the money and avoid the drama. Don't get too involved and you'll be fucking fine."

Mickey snorted at that. "Getting fucking involved? No thanks."

"Great. Now can y'all please shut up so I can enjoy the fucking game? Oh, and it's Mickey and not me, so y'all assholes now owe me twenty bucks."

All the brothers grunted in unison at that and flipped him off, resuming to watch the game.

 

***

 

In the clinic, Mickey went by Mickey Straits, Nick Straits's long lost son, recently found again. Nobody was dumb enough to actually buy this bullshit, but they knew all too well about Nick's debts not to question Mickey too much, nor to be surprised when one fine day he showed up to the clinic, permanently, instead of Nick.

It didn't take a genius to connect the dots and realize Mickey was much more of a Milkovich offspring material than anything else, Straits making no exception.

Nick had been thoughtful enough to have someone soothe it all, though. Richa Enis, on top of her work as a nurse and receptionist and secretary, was also in charge of the coordination. Only her knew about Mickey's exact identity, and she took care of the red tape for him.

She insisted on having him wearing a bunch of boring clothes from the start, because he was "supposed to be a  _therapist_ in here, not a gangster." Grudgingly, he ended up by complying because he admittedly wasn't much of a trustworthy therapist with his casual baggies and tank tops; which, for a social job, was kind of a problem. Hence the gloves to cover up his tattoos, the neat shirts and the serious-looking glasses.

Richa actually proved to be a nice human being after that, and Mickey bitterly regretted her company when he had to deal with the other two therapists, Boris Pisapio and Silvana Peckham. The two smug shits looked down on him but didn't go further than those aggressive looks, probably because they kept in mind that saying anything wrong could easily get an army of angry Milkoviches knocking down their doors in the middle of the night for a vendetta.

Being a fake therapist within an actual medical team had a price, though. Mickey didn't have a say on the patients he was given. So he got the  _regulars_ , as Boris and Silvana dismissively called them.

The label always had Richa twitch, and it didn't take long for Mickey to understand why; the regulars were the recidivists, the ones who had dropped therapy at least twice and had little to no hope of recovery; basically, the ones on whom the other two therapists had given up long ago.

Mickey didn't mind much; in fact, it was probably better to deal with people who had already been in the system before.

What struck Mickey first was that those people were all so  _different_. They were all poor enough to rely on a public clinic, but there were female and male, little and tall, skinny and fat, old and young patients. The one thing that remained commonly shared, though, was the feeling of brokenness. That no one would ever find their pieces and glue them all together. That changing the way nature had fucked them up was doomed.

Truthfully, Mickey didn't know if something was in fact wrong with them or not. He didn't have nearly enough knowledge about the whole psychic workings or whatever to tell, not at all. Maybe they were. Maybe they weren't, but people, starting from the therapists themselves as soon as they labelled them as part of the regulars, got them to believe they were.

At first, Mickey figured that as long as he showed up, he wouldn't have to worry too much about them anyway. Just like Colin said, no drama. Sure, fake therapy required to fake talk, but he figured it'd be easy to mind his own business all the while they kept babbling or whatever; hell, he'd seen enough movies to know psychologists actually drew during their sessions.

Mickey knew he shouldn't care. He knew he shouldn't give a shit about the poor, the miserable, the ones who didn't have enough money to pay for a private therapist and had to rely on the public health service for the umpteenth time.

That was how Milkoviches were raised: never care about the poorer, the miserabler, when you're poor and miserable yourself. Charity was never a part of the family motto; struggle for life was.

He knew he should only care about keeping his money good, and easy. That was it. Lazing in his massive chair behind his massive desk three days a week, and never care about what was happening during the office hours outside the clinic.

The swiftness with which this certitude weakened, though, alarmed him.

How could it have been otherwise, though, when Mickey had witnessed all sorts of fucked ups in his own life, starting from his own parenting? In the end, those people were just like him. They were struggling to find out who they were, while juggling with how people expected them to be.

_Don't get too involved and you'll be fucking fine._

Before even realizing it, Mickey got closer to this little world. He was involved in his patients' decisions, eager to know if they had gotten better since the last time he saw them, and impatient to have them getting their lives back on track. Which, by the way, didn't mean he wasn't still a piss-poor therapist.

Once he understood that, he became extra cautious with words and silences and the balance in-between, and always went to Richa whenever he doubted about something.

Thankfully, Silvana and Boris took care of the patient's meds' balancing. The three of them had (painful) meetings every morning where they discussed their patients and changed Mickey's patients' prescriptions judging on how Mickey described their behaviors.

He had to take extra care of how each of them behaved during their sessions - he actually started taking fucking  _notes_ \- to describe it perfectly to the therapists so that their treatments were correctly adjusted. And that required him to be very cautious of them and keep track of their progression. He reported any anomaly, any change.

Mickey cared.

He couldn't see a way out of it. He fucking cared, he had gone soft and that was doing the exact opposite both his brothers and his own mind were telling him was safe. He cared, and that was fucking dangerous, because these people trusted him, regardless of his under-qualification. The consequence of one stupid, wrongly phrased sentence was unpredictable.

Mickey didn't want to even imagine bad things happening to anyone of them. They already didn't deserve half the shit happening to them.

And out of all his patients, he cared about Ian the most.

It was just so fucking weird. Ian was a weird kid. Not in a bad, broken-wise way. He was just so fucking brave, somehow. Mickey had found himself thinking about him way more than he should, even outside the clinic's sanitized walls.

And their last session had definitely got him worrying for two entire weeks.

His blood had turned blue thinking about what the redhead might have done once he left the office in the middle of their session. Mickey was left reflecting on how much of a coward he had been to let him be instead of following him or whatever.

The kid could have done something as stupid as cutting himself. Or end his life. Just like that. Just because Mickey had thought with his feet instead of his brain, had let the Milkovich take the better part of him.

For the first time in three months, that had Mickey questioning his very presence in the clinic. Sure, he was earning money; but was this money worth a twenty year-old's death on the conscience?

The answer was simple, and the answer was  _fuck_  no.

_Don't get too involved and you'll be fucking fine._

Fuck that.

Mickey was involved with Ian and fuck, he wanted to be.

 

***

 

Mickey was so relieved when Ian actually showed up for his fifth session he should have felt ashamed. He waited for the wave of shame to overwhelm him, as a punishment for being such a soft ass. It didn't come, though.

Worry nonetheless, did.

Ian looked like he was going to fall on the floor out of exhaustion. But Mickey knew Ian was a grown-ass man who could ask him to come over if he needed him to, so he fought back the urge to stand up and meet him. Instead, even as it had him biting painfully on his inner cheek, he stayed grounded in his chair as though his life depended on it, remaining alert nonetheless the whole time in case the redhead would indeed fall, up until Ian made it to the chair. He collapsed on it and lolled his head towards Mickey.

Mickey let out a sigh of relief he didn't know he had been keeping.

The shadows under Ian's eyes were darker than usual; his skin, already pale in general, almost glowed, and the freckles themselves seemed faded. He looked so tired it pulled a grimace out of Mickey.

"Hey, you okay?" he asked, genuinely concerned.

That question earned him a glare. "Yeah."

"What happened to you?"

"Nothing. I'm fine."

"Alright, alright," Mickey said quickly.

He decided to calm the redhead down before hopefully getting him to talk. "I, uh," he started bravely but stopped to bite his tongue. He had practiced the apology. Like a dickhead in front of his mirror. It shouldn't be so hard. But then, it's not like he ever got used to apologize. "About last time. I shouldn't have--you know. I shouldn't have said that. I'm sorry."  _I do give a shit. I care._ The words wouldn't cross his lips. And that was dumb, because technically, he _could_ say such a thing to a patient.

"I'm sorry, and I want you to get better. We all do, that's why you're here," he concluded, cringing inwardly. Not exactly what he wanted to say, but that would do.

Ian sank a bit deeper into his chair.

Mickey cleared his throat uncomfortably. Talking was to Ian exhausting. Ian looking at him was exhausting.

"So, how's our planning thing going?"

Ian ignored that, staring at the desk instead, like he used to do during the very first sessions. Mickey tried again.

"You know, the waking up thing? Where you have to set up an alarm and do st–"

"Didn't do it," Ian huffed quietly.

Mickey furrowed his eyebrows. Anger rushed up his head at the attitude, but then, he had never been really good at containing it, and the Milkovich house sure didn't ever help him getting through these anger issues. He counted to ten and pushed the things on his desk aside so he could have a better look on Ian. He tried not to look affected by his terrible, tired face. At least not too much. "Why not?"

"Just didn't feel like it," Ian muttered, his eyes avoiding Mickey's again.

"You gotta do it, though, Ian," Mickey pressed.

"Why the fuck do you have to be like everyone else?" Ian suddenly asked, this time looking at him.

Mickey raised two disbelieving eyebrows, confused. "What the fuck did you expect me to be?" he asked, his voice rising at the end of the question. "I'm you're fucking therapist."

"I don't know," Ian shouted, then his voice became much softer, "I don't fucking know, okay."

"Ian," Mickey began, trying to get his voice to a relatively low level, failing miserably, "do you still take your meds?"

"For fuck's sake," he threw his hands in the air, "the meds again? What if I don't?"

"Then you'll have to, again. You _need_ it, okay? Ian!"

Fuming, Ian had stood up. Mickey came rapidly around the desk to block the exit. "Ian, Ian, man, listen," he tried to say, but honestly he didn't know where to start, if he was supposed to threaten him (definitely not the best idea, but that's the only technique he learnt as a kid), or calm him down or whatever the fuck else.

Ian's eyes looked like two fireballs out of focus.

Maybe he was having a crisis, or something like that. Mickey knew bipolar disorder tended to make people aggressive when they were not taking their medication.

"I just want you to be fine, Ian."

"I'm fucking fine."

"Fuck, Ian! You've gotta admit you're not," Mickey finally exploded. He was aware not to crowd Ian's space too much, but kept moving in front of him so as to prevent him from going outside. "And you're not gonna get any better if you keep being a stubborn shit about it!"

Ian got in his face at that. "You're the stubborn shit, okay!" he snapped, "I'm fucking fine, and you," he jabbed Mickey in the thorax, "Fiona, and everyone else need to shut the fuck up about it," and as Mickey was about to reply, he gestured angrily about the room, "I've been through this before. It's my third time here. I've only gotten worse." His hand clenched into a fist, on Mickey's chest, his face reddening alarmingly.

"Ian!" Mickey barked uselessly, but the younger man shoved past him to get to the door.

And then, everything happened in a few seconds.

Ian tripped over his long legs, and time slowed down. Mickey saw this gangly body wobble in slow-mo, as though he couldn't do anything else but just stand there and watch dumbly. Ian collapsed then on the hard, cold floor in a thud, rolling a little to the side. Didn't move from an inch from there.

And time got back on track, only Ian was spread over the floor and Mickey was two hundred percent panicking now.

"Ian!" Mickey exclaimed again, but his tone was completely different from before. His heart was pounding in his chest.

He dashed and knelt beside Ian. The boy's eyes were shut, motionless.

"Ian, fuck," Mickey said. He straightened the upper part of Ian's body to rest his back against his chest, searching for Ian's pulse point on his neck.

He heaved a sight of relief as he simultaneously felt his heartbeat underneath his fingers and heard him breathe, albeit weakly. "Ian, do you hear me?" he tried again, and almost jumped in surprise when he actually got a response.

"Don't call the ER."

"Fuck, Ian-"

" _Please._ "

Mickey squeezed Ian's shoulder to calm him. "It's okay," he murmured quietly, "I've got you." He slid his hand up and down his arm absentmindedly, the touch soft and comforting. Ian kept pleading him weakly, and Mickey didn't have the heart to be the moron sending him to yet another clinic. He was safe with him, at least.

"Richa!"

The door was swung open and Richa gasped at the sight of the redhead resting almost completely against Mickey, the latter holding his wrist and the back of his neck.

"Jesus Christ, what happened, Mickey??"

"Ian Gallagher," Mickey replied, not sparing her a gaze as he watched Ian. He pressed his body against the younger man, not releasing his tight grip around him yet. "Give me his address."

 

***

 

"There," Mickey indicated as he shoved Richa's sticky note in front of the driver's face.

The cabbie nodded slowly, but didn't unlock the doors when Mickey tried to open them. "Shouldn't your friend get some medical assistance or something?"

Mickey stood back, nonplussed by the very question. He shifted to get a better hold of Ian whose arm was slung around Mickey's shoulder.

"He's with me. I'm his therapist, and the clinic right there," he jerked his thumb towards the building, "asked me to bring him home. It's just fatigue and he needs his family."

The way the cabbie scrunched his nose at that showed how pretty fucking suspicious he was, and honestly it sounded shady even to Mickey. But then, he had a giant redhead crushing him with the weight of his muscles and _he_ was pretty fucking impatient to get to his house too. "You know what," he huffed with finality when the cabbie remained silent, "I'll just take another cab."

There were other cabs, a bit higher up the street. He wrapped one arm around Ian's back, and Ian gave Mickey a hard time as his head rolled on Mickey's shoulder and his nose nudged his neck, his warm breath hitting the skin. Mickey hissed, but tried to push the weird feeling in his insides aside, and grabbed Ian's waist. Before he could transport them just a little further than a few inches, the cab caught up with them, and the driver popped his head out of the window. "Sorry, sir, sorry," he apologized, "It's just, you know? I don't want any problem."

Mickey stopped at that, spinning so as to stare at the driver intently. "What kind of problem?"

"The too-drunk-to-consent kind of problem. I don't know."  

"Do I look like a fucking fag to you?" Mickey snapped and Ian managed to roll his head the other way at that, which pained them both more than they would ever admit it. "I mean," he tried to put things right, "it's four in the afternoon, if you start worrying now you better not work at ten in the neighborhood I want you to drive to."

The cabbie didn't argue and opened his door to Mickey who maneuvered the two of them inside.

It wasn't so hard to say if Mickey had been thinking of himself or Ian first, when he decided to take a cab and bring Ian home. He could still try to convince himself. Say that it was a lot less troubles than calling security and risking his cover in case the clinic suddenly decided they gave a shit and stuck their noses into the Mickey Straits File.

Honestly, though, he knew better. First off, he never takes cabs. It's expensive and useless when the L can just do its job, barely but still. And he was paying out of his own pocket. Second, while he could pretend otherwise, he was genuinely worried about Ian. And he knew by experience that waking up in a foreign environment had got to be one of the most stress-inducing thing ever. Ian needed his home; his family. Finally, Ian had asked him to. What else could he do?

Ian was half lying against Mickey, his head resting against his shoulder. His weak breathing was almost even now. He looked a lot more peaceful than in the office, but starts shook his body periodically, as though he was having nightmares. Mickey wanted to run a hand through his red hair, soothe him, show him he was by his side and that they were going home and that there was nothing he should be panicking about right now. Instead, he twisted his hands in his lap because he was scared shitless to do any of those things, letting Ian against him nonetheless because the very feeling of his touch reassured him.

He knew talking to people having those sorts of crisis could help them, but he simply couldn't get his mouth to work. The few suspicious glances he got from the cabbie weren't helping either. At one point, Ian shivered with force and hunched against him, so Mickey looked down at him and, forgetting everything, tipped his head against him, real quick, because he couldn't help it.

They were just a few blocks away when the cabbie pulled at the curb and announced they had reached their destination. Something in Mickey's stomach flipped at the proximity with his own house.

Once the creepy cabbie paid and gone, they were back on the street with Ian almost crashing him with his giant legs and arms and limbs and as Mickey was trying to figure out a way to get the four legged creature he had become to walk, a teenager across the street went running down at him and if he wasn't holding the damn kid, he would've punched her in the face- in self-defense.

"Fiona!" she shouted, and Mickey caught the way her hair looked just like Ian's.

Two people joined her, another teenage boy and an older girl, and they dashed to Ian.

"Oh my god, Ian! Where were you?" the brown-haired girl said.

Sensing the moment he would have to let go of Ian, it was Mickey's turn to press his face against Ian's neck briefly, before he presented him to what he assumed was the Gallagher tribe.

"He was at the clinic," Mickey answered and the three seemed to notice him for the first time. They went silent and the older took Ian in her arms. He gave them all a tight smile, and made an abrupt turn before they could ask him anything else.

 

***

 

"Good morning, sunshine."

Ian emerged slowly. He remembered having the sweetest dream.

"Don't you want to wake up? It's all sunny outside."

Fiona rubbed a hand on his upper-arm. It was irritating at best, really maddening at worst, and she was answered by nothing but a cold silence that made her sigh. Ian felt like a terrible brother for a second, a feeling soon washed over by some utter exasperation mixed with tiredness and just overall, the want to do nothing and to be left alone.

"Are you still taking your meds?"

"Leave me the fuck alone," Ian managed to mutter pathetically, his voice muffled against the pillow. How fucking long still was everyone going to keep asking him that?

"Okay," Fiona murmured to soothe him, "sorry. You shouldn't have gone, yesterday, though. I asked you not to; you seemed so bad already." She rearranged a lock behind his ear and looked at him with eyes so teary they could probably fill an ocean. "We're lucky the therapist got you back."

Fuck.

 _Fuck_ , that wasn't a dream. Mickey actually got him back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quick note to say THANK YOU! we're halfway through the story already and I wouldn't have gone as far as the second chapter without your kudos and comments and support. Writing a multichap is a whole new thing to me, and knowing some people are reading despite the many many flaws makes me honestly so happy. ♥ I hope you'll stick around! C:


	5. session six quieted

Mickey was trying not to be too frantic, or panicked, but _fuck_ , it was three and a half already and Ian wasn't showing up. He looked down at the papers spread on his desk and pushed them angrily to the side to plant his forehead there instead. He wasn't getting any work done, therapy-related or otherwise, when his mind was heavily cluttered by Ian. Was he safe? did his family take care of him? why didn't he show up? did he take his pills? The thought of him bounced everywhere in Mickey's brain, more insistent and threatening each time.

Unable to take it anymore, he stood up and stormed out of his office, looking for Richa whose relieving presence had so far always proved to be a blessing whenever he felt so edgy. He found her behind her desk, adjacent to the waiting room, typing silently on her computer. Clearing his throat, he approached her nervously. She looked up at the noise, blinked a few times to focus back on her surroundings after being on the computer for so long, and smiled at him questioningly. Such a peacefulness sometimes spooked Mickey, but right now, he thought he could borrow some.

"Any news from Ian Gallagher?" he asked, the words coming out of his mouth abruptly even though he hadn't meant them to be.

"Ah," she sighed and leaned back on her chair, granting Mickey with her full attention, "No. I got a call the day after you brought him back home, a nice girl who said he was tired, but fine. Nothing to report since then."

Mickey's face fell a little at that. He sat on her desk, his eyes darting about as if he was looking for some sort of answer in the room. "That's not so bad to be low on news. I mean, they would've called if something had happened, right?" he asked after a while, trying not to let the hint of hope in his voice betray him.

"I wouldn't be so sure, unfortunately. Ian never called back the last two times he dropped out of therapy." She didn't miss the way Mickey worried his lower lip between his teeth at that, adding hurriedly, "but then, it's the first time he seems so involved in his treatment. He didn't even last two sessions with Silvana, so there's definitely some progress here."

Only remotely convinced, Mickey shrugged. "Maybe," he allowed. "Or maybe that's just because Silvana's a massive bitch."

Richa stood up and came around her desk. She stopped in front of Mickey to give him a comforting smile. "Coffee?" she offered as if she sensed that Mickey needed a break—a break from what, he couldn't tell, but a break nonetheless. Mickey nodded. She came back with two cups a moment later, displaying them both on the desk before hopping on it next to Mickey. She was so tiny her legs swayed in the air, while his own feet touched the floor. He minutely thought of presenting her to his brothers, show them he wasn't the fucking tiniest human being on planet Earth.

"What about you?" she asked once they both had their cups in hand, staring at the wall ahead of them, "Do you think he's going better?"

"I don't know. I thought so? I mean, he barely looks in my direction at all at first, but then he talks a bit, so I figure he's getting better, until he comes back all cheery and shit, and the next thing I know he's sprawled on the floor panicking. It's just—I don't know," he concluded softy, letting out a very long, deep sight that probably came from the bottom of his stomach.

Richa stretched her arm to pat her small hand on his shoulder. While this would have normally done nothing but piss Mickey off, it was oddly calming under the circumstances; besides, Mickey had come to her in the first place knowing she always comforted people that way. "It's what happens when they quit the treatment," she said quietly. "They feel like they're unbreakable at first, until they drop again."

So now, Mickey had the confirmation that the weird behavior might indeed be linked with the fact that Ian might have gotten off his medication. But Mickey was pretty sure Ian used to take it, at first at least. He had a strange feeling about it all, even though he couldn't pinpoint it. "Somehow I feel like it's because of me," he confessed.

Richa narrowed her eyes. "You _asked_ him to stop taking his pills?"

"Fuck, no!" he scowled, his exclamation maybe a bit loud, he thought as he saw the door opposite to his office flipping open a few seconds later, and a disgruntled Boris appearing behind, catching them both red-handed chatting during office hours. "Could you please be quiet for those of us who actually come here to work?" he demanded, all accusatory eyebrows raised.

Richa swiftly caught Mickey's hand before he could give him the finger. "Sorry Boris, my fault. I asked Mickey an indiscreet question about one of his patients and he was reminding me about the confidentiality rule, loudly I will admit." Boris grunted and slammed his door back into place, leaving Mickey staring blankly at Richa for a while. "Fuck, that's right, the confidentiality rule," he muttered flatly, "I'm so fucking bad at this."

"You kinda are. But if you ask me, Silvana and Boris are even worse, and they don't even have an excuse," she laughed. Then, more seriously, "Whatever it is that's going on between the two of you, it's not your fault, Mickey. You can't force him to do anything." Mickey nodded. He didn't want to force Ian. But while Richa had indeed helped, he just couldn't shake the worry off.

"I always wondered if Sil and Boris were sleeping together," the secretary suddenly said, drawing him out of his thoughts as if on cue, wiking conspiratorially at Mickey. He always had some trouble adjusting to Richa's geniality but he managed to pull a tight smile, nudging his nose into his lukewarm coffee.

"Most boring sex in the history of sex," he grumbled and she chuckled, going on with the last time she saw them interacting and how there was definitely some sexual tension going around. Mickey listened, grateful for the distraction, by her side. Gossiping about those two shits couldn't hurt.

 

***

 

The clock's fifth ring stirred Mickey back to life. He was officially done in the office for the day, and Ian hadn't come.

Him and Richa walked together to the station. Richa was taking the brown line where Mickey needed to go onto the pink line, going to the South Side, and her lucky charm's effect died the moment they split. The further away from Richa's harmonious aura the L was transporting him, the antsier Mickey got. His anxiety gauge was already filled by the time he reached the fourth stop or so; he still had more than half a dozen of them to be home.

People were looking at him weirdly in the train, like they could see it on his face that he didn't belong here. Until those got out at some bourgie stop and the ones that entered the L started to recognize him the closer to the neighborhood he got, and the curious looks were rather directed towards his unusual, smart outfit. Some of the faces were familiar to Mickey, who had thought they'd have gotten used to it at some point. Apparently not. The fun of seeing a South Side trash like Mickey Milkovich dressed like a headwaiter or whatever apparently never died.

He got out at the Kedzie-Cermak stop and let his steps guide him from there, down Kedzie Avenue, turning right along West 21st Street, but instead of continuing a bit further, he took the fourth street on the left and got himself in South Homan Avenue, where he kept walking, the sky dark but the surroundings similar to the picture Mickey had printed in his mind two weeks from then. He got past the 2100, then the 2110, and before he knew it, he was standing in front of Ian's house.

On theory, that was a good idea; go check on Ian, see if he's okay. But being in front of the Gallagher house was a different kettle of fish, and Mickey instantly regretted his unexpected bravery. As he was about to chicken out, a neatly-cut head of brownish hair popped out of the window and hollered at him. He turned round, seeing the teenager gazing at him up and down several times before grinning. Without breaking eye-contact, he screamed inside the house, "Fiona! There's someone for you on the porch." He shifted his focus back on Mickey and nodded once towards him, grinning broadly, "How long have you been standing there, weirdo?"

Mickey had always thought he looked kind of threatening in his office clothes, a bit mafia-like, but apparently, he needed more than that to impress the South Side kid. Raising his eyebrows, he pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose with one hand and flicked him off with the other, thankfully downing it right before a brown-haired girl appeared behind him, the one who used to come with Ian at the clinic, and also, the one who scrapped him off Mickey's own arms two weeks ago. She swatted the back of what seemed to be her younger brother's head, the scene oddly familiar and endearing to Mickey.

"Don't talk like that, Carl," she scolded, pointing at the kid who walked away while rolling his eyes theatrically. She smacked him upside the head again, and leaned on the window frame. "Hi, you're the therapist, right?" she asked, confused, when she saw Mickey in the street, craning his neck to see her. She disappeared from the window, and Mickey finally risked one foot inside the property before she reappeared behind the opened door. "I'm Fiona," she said once Mickey was at the stairs' foot, "Ian's sister. I know we've met, but I never introduced myself properly."

"Mickey," he said, and was grateful she only hummed in acknowledgement and didn't held out a hand for him to shake.

"I'm sorry about Carl. Bad parenting," she explained quickly and shook her head in a _what can you do_ motion, before adding, her eyes earnest, "and thank you for last time. Really. We were so worried about Ian."

Mickey looked away briefly. "Can we talk?"

"Sure," she replied slowly, looking slightly worried now, as she sidestepped for Mickey to come in. "But you know we can't afford paying you overtime, right?"

"Don't worry about it," he said dismissively. Visibly still confused, Fiona tilted her head and opened her mouth, but didn't vocalize her surprise, simply enjoined him to follow her inside silently instead.

From what Mickey could see, the house looked just like any South Side house, messy and a bit dirty; but somehow, Ian's house seemed much warmer than his own house. The two teenagers from the night Mickey brought back Ian, plus another kid, were lying on the couch next to the front door, watching some random program on the TV. Carl flicked him off as Mickey walked past them, for good measure, and Mickey rolled his eyes.

Fiona led him into the kitchen. She poured some coffee in a cup and handed it to him in silence, and he took it because he figured the caffeine couldn't stress him out any more that he already was anyway, even though it was maybe his hundredth of the day. He settled on one of the chair around the table after Fiona vaguely gestured towards them, pouring herself some coffee now.

"He wasn't always like this," she sighed after she settled on the chair across his. She cupped her mug and took a long breath, focusing on some imaginary point on the ceiling. Mickey felt like an intruder; first, he had come all the way down to Ian's house, and now, his sister seemed on the verge of telling him more personal things than he had ever heard from Ian himself. He was breaching his intimacy.

"He takes after our mother. She was bipolar. He was going better—well at least I thought he was. Until like, three weeks ago?" That was before their last disastrous encounter, Mickey noted rapidly in his head, then focused back on what Fiona was saying. "He started staying in bed all day, like he does when he's depressed. That Wednesday, when you took him back, he was so white in the morning... I thought he was gonna black out. I asked him not to go to therapy. Stay home, I said. But when Debbie went to check up on him at two and a half, he was... nowhere. Gone. She called me, I left my shift right away and we started searching for him. We searched everywhere, but we couldn't find him. He has already ran away in the past, so we thought maybe he did it again," she moved one hand around, shutting her eyes helplessly. "Until you came here. That's how we knew he was at the free clinic."

"Yes, he was with me the whole time," Mickey confirmed slowly, hoping to calm the obvious distress on her face.

She shook her head. "Hadn't thought of going there. He never goes there on his own, especially when he's depressed."

Mickey froze at the implication. Ian never went to the clinic unless he was forced, Richa's words. They sat in a puzzled silence for a little while, until Fiona pointed at the stairs. "He's up there, if you want to talk to him," she buried her head in her hands, "honestly, I don't know what to do."

Fuck if he knew. He emptied his cup and stood up. "I'll go check up on him," he replied instead and headed for the stairs, Fiona nodding tiredly behind him.

He climbed them up and found himself crowded by a ton of doors. He tried the one in front of him, but it was just a bathroom. He then opened the one on the right, spilling the corridor's light into it, but the room's darkness still made it hard to see anything. He squinted his eyes, guessing the shape of the three beds there and, on the tiny one against the wall, Ian, curled in a foetal position, his back to Mickey.

Mickey couldn't explain what sudden wave of relief seeing Ian in the flesh, obviously exhausted, yet alive, triggered in his stomach, after spending days thinking about him, hours talking about him with Richa and just now Fiona, but this lack of comprehension didn't prevent his chest from tightening painfully. He tried to push all those thoughts to the back of his head as he walked closer, the old floor creaking underneath his shoes.

Ian rolled slowly at the sound, and his eyes went wide when Mickey came into his sight. "Hey," Mickey heard himself say, hating the way his voice softened. Oddly, he wanted to tell Ian that everything was going to be fine, even though there was no way he could assure him that. It was strange to be with him in such an intimate place, far from the clinic's cold and impersonal background.

Ian folded his legs to enable him to sit at the edge of the bed.

A small heap of broken gears and plastic on the floor retained Mickey's attention. Picking it up, he realized it was, or at least used to be a clock. He immediately understood with that that Ian had actually been trying to set up a routine, unless he just liked to break clocks and let their bits on the floor for Mickey to step on. Probably because of the depression, though, he hadn't been able to achieve that. Mickey was so fucking proud that Ian still tried. "I'll fix it up for you," he said hoarsely, his throat strangely tight, "I'm pretty good at it, you'll see."

Without a word, Ian sat up. He reached out for Mickey's wrist, wrapped a hand around it and using his grip, pulled him closer so he was sitting on the bed with him. He then took Mickey's glasses between his thumb and his index, taking them off along with his gloves.

Mickey went completely still. He knew his tattoos weren't visible, hell, he could barely see Ian's expression in the darkness, but somehow he _didn't want_ him to know about the FUCK-U-UP. It was an ugly part of him he didn't want Ian to be aware of.

Ian didn't seem to notice. He just put everything on his nightstand, and even though there was no more room between the two of them to justify the gesture, went back at one of Mickey's now bare hand, keeping it into his own. He placed it on his waist and pressed his face into the crook of Mickey's neck. The older boy stiffened, but didn't let go of his hold on Ian, tightened it even, and didn't swat him away either when he looped his arms around his shoulders.

The hug was so tight and slow and tender and foreign to Mickey, but there were Ian's shaky breaths hitting his skin and his body curled up against his and he couldn't think straight, couldn't see anything else in the darkness but the vulnerable, redheaded boy he wanted to protect so badly. He tipped his head against Ian's and stroked his free hand along the nape of his neck up to the top of his head, up until they were both relaxed against each another and Mickey's eyes had acclimated to the darkness. Ian had stopped shivering.

Ian pulled away slightly then, and pulled at the hem of Mickey's shirt until both of their tops were tossed on the floor and their legs spread with their flies unzipped and Mickey had Ian's cock in his hand. Ian licked his palm before grabbing Mickey too and whatever gentleness had been going on between them before switched for something frantic as they both started getting each other off as silently as they could.

Ian's breaths were short and wet and definitely arousing against Mickey's neck and Mickey himself couldn't bit back the few sighs that climbed up his throat. He tried to focus on his eagerness to please Ian, to make him feel _good_ , trying his hardest to give him what he wanted, but the feeling of Ian's hand on him was strong. He gave Ian a long stroke and tipped his thumb against the underside of his cock, rubbing it there without touching the head completely.

"Mickey," Ian hissed, pressing their bodies together again, and that was the first time ever that Mickey was hearing Ian pronounce his name, and he shouldn't have been surprised that it sounded this natural, like it belonged here, but the pounding in his chest definitely said otherwise. It felt like his whole world had turned upside down. He did it again, hoping to hear it again, hoping Ian would just fucking say it again. Ian complied, whispering, "fuck, Mickey," his voice broken.

Mickey's movements around Ian's cock became so sloppy that Ian shifted his hips closer and took over by grabbing them both to fuck them together.

Mickey let a mortifying moan escape his mouth that he barely registered, too focused on the ecstatic feeling of Ian pressed against him. His heart threatened to explode. He was in Ian's room, surrounded by Ian's presence and scent and hands and cock and if Ian had leaned over just that little bit, he could have kissed him and Mickey wouldn't even have fought it. He had had handjobs in the past, plenty of them, whether drunk or in some bar's restroom, but of this kind—never.

He gripped at Ian's back with both of his hands, scratching him a little the closer to his climax he got. Suddenly, he shivered, tried to warn Ian but the intensity of his orgasm hit him quicker than expected, and he spilled in Ian's hand in a strangled breath. Ian followed him before his own waves of pleasure had even died out.

Breathless, Mickey fell against Ian who fell against the mattress.

Running his thumb on Ian's red eyebrow, down his temple to his freckled cheeks, Mickey fell asleep there, exhausted in the tangle of sheets and soaked in the sticky come drying between them, but after all those weeks of angst, finally fulfilled in the warmth of Ian's arms.


	6. the morning after

When Mickey woke up, he found himself in a foreign environment, with a dead arm and sans shirt, and the first thought that crossed his mind was that he was still dreaming. It felt familiar, being stuck and trapped in the darkness like that, like in one of those race nightmares where he just couldn't ever get his body to function, and in which his dad always played an important role.

But the more he was emerging, the clearer it became that this darkness surrounding him, and this solid weight crushing his arm, was nothing but a back, a man's back that is--Ian's, he identified at last, with much eye squinting, when he noticed the touch of orange on the shoulders, neck and arms.

Weird pins and needles in his left arm and out-of-body experience feeling aside, Mickey felt oddly grounded, and, eyes glued to the ceiling, he basked in the feeling for a little while, listening to Ian's even breaths beside him.

Eventually though, almost reluctantly, he pulled his arm away from Ian's side, miraculously managing to do so without waking him up. He propped himself up on his retrieved elbow and looked down. Why he couldn't keep away from staring at Ian's sleepy, peaceful face, fuck if he knew. Or maybe he did know. Ian looked beautiful when he didn't seem so tormented, and Mickey loved seeing him like that.

Streams of lights lightened his red hair and skin, slightly covered by goose pimples because of the morning chill, and with this halo of grace floating around his body, it almost looked like he and Mickey didn't belong to the same worlds. He looked perfect.

Inspecting his back again, Mickey blinked a few times when he spotted marks next to some freckles, like some sorts of scratches on the skin. He brushed his fingers on them, lingered them there, and was scooting closer, intending on pressing his lips against the freckles scattered on Ian's right shoulder, because he suddenly felt the need to do it, when he was yanked out of the spell by someone clearing their throat.

He looked over his shoulder, seeing the flicking-off-teenager standing behind them, who stared right back at him. They both raised eyebrows  _and_ middle finger by way of greetings, and Carl smirked appreciatively at that, like he damn approved Mickey's manners.

"Breakfast's downstairs, dickhead," he said, and took a backpack before heading outside. Mickey's stomach growled painfully at the mention of food, and he rolled off the bed, rubbing his eyes with his hands. He didn't remember what he'd worn the day before, so he slipped on whatever came first, a shirt discarded somewhere near the foot of the bed, before following Carl's steps.

He had no idea of how long he'd slept, but the kitchen was already busy, and the table full, when he made it down the stairs. One kid, two teenagers, plus a young adult, maybe of Fiona's age or a little younger, he'd never seen, were gathered there, while Fiona was making eggs behind the hot plates. He absently wondered whether Gallaghers simply reproduced themselves overnight.

"-lieve I have to remind you to take your backpack before going to school, Carl," Fiona was saying from behind the counter to the unimpressed teenager chewing a toast, "You're in high school now, you should know these things!"

"Still can't believe you made it to high school," the younger girl said, rolling her eyes.

"You'll never make it to college, bitch," he responded and without missing a beat, the girl literally roared out and balanced her own bag on her shoulder. "You'll see, bitch!" she shouted before storming out to the living-room, several pairs of eyes following her on her way to the front door, that she banged furiously behind her.

Carl jabbed his temple with his index. "Reverse psychology," he explained with a crooked grin. While Mickey was simply observing this strange piece of domesticity, the two adults sighed, and the little black kid giggled.

Fiona was the first to talk, her hands on her hips. "Debbie's serious about college, Carl. You shouldn't tease her about it. In fact, you should take her as a model," he scoffed at that, so she shook her hands in a helpless move. "At least, leave her alone. You wouldn't like it, if we were making fun of your future plans."

"Or taste in porn," the new guy supplied with a smirk. Carl went all white.

"… yeah, that too," Fiona nodded reluctantly.

"At least clean your history, man," Unknown Guy said with an amused snort at Carl's crumbling face.

Fiona came around the table with her finally finished eggs and nudged her little brother in the ribs. "Go catch up with your sister. "

Carl sighed theatrically and munched another toast, all enthusiasm gone, and headed towards the door like his sister a few minutes ago. Before he could reach it, Fiona hollered at him, her arms crossed on her chest. "Carl! Your bag!", and New Guy started laughing. Fiona smacked Carl upside the head (again) when he dragged his feet to the table to swing the bag on his hunched shoulder. "You can at least  _pretend_  you're going."

He mumbled something like "yeah, whatever," and finally got outside, leaving the two adults and the kid alone.

Mickey was still standing down the stairs like a dumb picket when Fiona noticed him. Her frustrated frown turned instantly into a bright smile, and she greeted him warmly. "Hey, Mickey! How long have you been standing here? Come eat with us! We've got eggs, toasts... Oh, and coffee! D'you want me to find you a mug? Ugh, Carl didn't do the dishes yesterday I see. Jesus, what's even the point of keeping a chore agenda in this house... Wait, there must be a clean one somewhere..."

The new Gallagher looked between Fiona and Mickey a few times, while Fiona was busy finding a cup for this stranger like it was the most normal thing to do, and Mickey stared back at him, then at the coffee pot, then back at Fiona, and it finally clicked all together. The strangeness of the situation. A feeling of panic surged in his system in record time.

Everything had seemed so normal in the morning, had felt so right, that he hadn't even felt the need to question any of it. Waking up next to Ian, eat a breakfast with his family, hear the siblings getting at each other; it was all the domesticity Mickey secretly craved. But there it was at last, the realization that he didn't belong here, didn't deserve any of this happiness. It flat-out got him panicking, his heartbeat increasing to an unhealthy speed.

"Who the fuck's that?" the guy said, and Mickey barely registered Fiona's hesitation as she introduced him as Ian's therapist, then friend, barely saw her putting a cup of coffee down on the table for him. Ears buzzing, he looked down at his bare hands gangling on each side of his body, tattoos visible, and every bit went back into place.

He was not staying over. This was not his life. He was a fake therapist. He was a fake therapist and Ian was his patient and he went down to his house to check on him because he was worried about him not showing up at the clinic, and they ended up rubbing their dicks together in his bedroom. A sudden need to throw up took him right from his guts.

To say that he freaked out would be a massive understatement. He took a brutal turn, the closest chair falling on the floor in the process, and, all three pairs of eyes staring at him, yanked the back door open to get out, almost tripping over the stairs in his haste. Managing to stay on his feet nonetheless, he ran outside the Gallagher property, kept running after the end of the street, and kept running after the five next ones just in case.

 

***

 

Sprawled on an empty lot near the tracks of the L, Mickey was trying to become one with the floor. Limbs limp and spread like a starfish, he let the late morning sun warm him. He'd been lying there for more than an hour already, but he could tell his heart hadn't quite calmed down.

Trying to keep his mind busy and away from last night's and the morning's events, he found himself wondering for the first time of his life how it'd be like to be a tree. Having roots anchoring him in the ground, not being able to move or think. That suddenly sounded so nice, so reassuring.

He was shaken out of his trance by his phone, buzzing against his thigh in his pocket. His first thought was to hang up on whoever that was, or simply not to take the call, but, as an after thought, he leveled it to his eyes, and answered when he saw the ID.

"Hey."

"Where the  _fuck_  have you been last night?" Mandy burst out, accusatory, as soon as he picked up.

Mickey flipped his phone closed before he could think.

He did it out of guilt, even though he knew his sister couldn't have a clue of what had happened during the night, but the mere thought of Ian made Mickey want to die. Like, why had it seemed so normal, almost perfect? Why his family hadn't made a big deal out of it? Was Ian awaken now? What did he say when he realized Mickey was gone, reacted when Fiona told him how he freaked out?

Reluctantly, he picked up when his phone buzzed a few seconds later, keeping it away from his ear, knowing all too well that Mandy had already started yelling. He was not disappointed.

"Did you just fuckin'  _hang up on me_?" she was screaming, "I can't fuckin' believe it! I wait for you all fuckin' afternoon, then all fuckin' night, I try to reach you on your fuckin' phone that you won't pick up--what's the point of having phone if you don't FUCKIN' USE IT--and when you finally do, you fuckin'  _hang up on me_?"

Slightly confused at the reason why he was being shouted at, Mickey frowned and brought the phone closer to his ear, keeping a safe distance with the device nonetheless. "What the fuck, you waited for me?"

A small silence followed his risky question. He thought she'd yell again, but to his surprise, Mandy just sounded exasperated, done even. "You're not fuckin' serious, Mickey."

"Wha'?"

"I can't fuckin' believe it. Wouldn't have paid for that stupid bus ticket if I knew you wouldn't give a shit."

"Oh, fuck, Mandy!" he exclaimed, wiping a hand across his face as he suddenly remembered what she was talking about. He folded all his limbs back against him, like a ball, getting ready to be a human again; or rather, accepting his fate as a human at last. "Fuck, sorry... I completely forgot you'd be home," he apologized lamely. Ian had been the main focus of his attention for weeks and he hadn't been able to take attention to anything else, even to his sister, despite the fact that they hardly saw each other now that she was in Indiana.

Years ago, he wouldn't have given two shits to know where she was, but now that she was away most of the time, he didn't want to miss her on her few visits in Chicago. But this time he'd forgotten, even though she'd sent him a text giving him the full details. He was the worst brother ever. He'd be much more useful as a tree than he is as a human, really. Produce paper, cast shadow in hot areas, all that.

"Hey," Mandy said after a silence, as Mickey was simply getting back on his feet and starting to walk, following the tracks of the L, "where's everyone? the house's empty."

"Went on a run with dad for a few days."

"You okay?" she sounded worried, which made Mickey feel even worse.

"Yeah."

Mandy sighed on the other side of the line, the sound both familiar reassuring, knowing her brother way too well to be fooled by the dullness of the answer. "Come back home. We've got a lot to catch up about, and I've got some good weed."

 

***

 

Mandy was waiting on the porch, hands on her hips, when Mickey finally made it all the way to their childhood home, from wherever he'd been. It felt like centuries ago, Mandy reflected as she saw his hunched silhouette dragging his feet on the pavement, the time when things were the other way around, when Mickey was the one sure support of the family protecting her from all the boys trying to finger-bang her in high school.

If she was being honest, he looked outright pathetic. She'd never seen him like this before. Even that one time she visited him when he was in juvie, he still looked better than he did right now.

"Hey asstwat," he insulted her lamely when he saw her standing on the porch, a sorry-sounding insult like she'd never heard one, an insult that had none of the finesse she remembered their insult spurts to have. "How's Indiana?"

She rolled her eyes. "Don't even fuckin' try, Mick."

He said nothing to that, looking seconds away from falling apart, and that left Mandy wondering what in hell might have happened to her brother while she was away. "Say what's wrong, and maybe I'll forgive you for forgettin' your sister," she huffed with a tentative smile, forcing a smile out of him at last.

"Yeah, sorry..."

She nodded towards the door. "C'mon in, big brother."

He did as he was told, and soon enough, there was weed on the coffee table, a joint in one of his hand, a bottle of beer in his other hand, and Mandy dancing around him, trying to find a passable station on their old radio. When she was satisfied by the creaky sound that came from the ancient device, she came sitting down next to him with a smug look on her face, and snatched the stick from him.

"Make your own," he mumbled, reconciling himself to taking a sip of his beer instead.

"Please. That stuff's mine to begin with," Mandy said with a raise of her eyebrows. "So? Who's this cunt and what did she do to you?" Mickey gave her a look over the rim of his beer, making her scoff. "What? You're gonna pretend it's not about a girl?" She let out a puff of smoke and tapped her brother's thigh. "If there's one thing I know, that's how it feels to be heartbroken. And let me tell you, your face looks ugly just the right amount for that."

"Whatever," Mickey said.

"Sure! Be sad on your own." Mickey closed his eyes at that, and Mandy went on with the provocative tone, the reaction so easy to drag out of Mickey. "Cry all the little tears of your eyes, let her take and wear your pants, do whatever and see if I care."

She knew she pushed it too far when she saw Mickey curling into a ball, as vulnerable as he could ever get, as she ever saw him be. She knocked her knee against his, awkwardly, her voice much softer. "You can't have been that serious, Mick. Who's that girl?"

"Not a girl," Mickey managed to croak.

"Damn, Mick. It's okay to be human once in a while, have feelings, all that." Mandy shook her head. Mickey could get so difficult when it came to his private life. He looked even more shaken, if that was possible. "She really fucked you up."

"I did."

Mickey had said it like it was a fact, nothing more, though Mandy could tell he was trying his hardest to keep a blank face. She let him take the joint between her fingers while she struggled to understand what was happening.

He downed his second beer, went back to the fridge to retrieve a few more when she made up her mind, and spoke. "You fucked her up," she repeated slowly, "so you're the one who broke her heart?"

"I don't--" he glanced up at Mandy, like he hadn't thought of it that way, "fuck, I don't know, maybe."

Mandy frowned, trying to remember the last time she had seen Mickey involved with a girl, or talking about a girl at all. Mickey had always been the most discreet out of her brothers when it came to his private life. He shared nothing but the bare minimum, while the others would brag about the last girls they'd had sex with and compare them, setting a big contest about the best fucks to determine a winner. Mandy herself wasn't so foreign to the concept; she used to bring tons of boyfriends at home back in the days. Mickey, though, never participated in those stupid contests.

Now that she thought about it, she'd never seen Mickey with anyone. Period. She could recall an Angie Zago he surely fucked, because everyone in the neighborhood had, when his brothers dragged him to their fucking around spree, but that was it. Mickey had always been the lonely one, and until now, Mandy had always thought he only cared about himself, and probably his family. Like an ace, or whatever. She was so wrong.

So she thought she deserved some time to process the whole thing. Mickey had a crush. And a serious one, if there was any. That was beyond her.

"She at the office?" she tried as Mickey was making it pretty clear that he wasn't going to volunteer any more information, back to his foetal position.

He nodded.

"She in the staff?" but when he shook his head, she almost didn't want to hear the answer to the question that followed. "She a patient?"

Mickey seemed absorbed by a grease stain on the cushions, and Mandy thought that was the signal that he wasn't going to answer, but eventually, he rubbed the heels of his hands against his eyes and blurted out, like he wanted it out and clear for the world that he was a dumbass, "yeah," his voice hoarse and croaky.

Obviously, he was well aware of the level of wrong in this situation, so Mandy didn't feel like adding another layer. Falling in love this a  _patient_ , though. How stupid her brother could get. She leaned against the back of the couch, wincing. "Fuck."

"Yeah."

"Wha' she in for?"

"Bipolar."

"Fuck," she repeated, trying to process the new information. "She was already fucked up, Mickey."

Mickey snorted. "Made it worse."

He glanced up, as though he expected his sister to cut him off, to contradict him somehow. But Mandy was listening attentively, now that the alcohol and drugs had loosened her brother up, even though she pretended to be focused on the cushions she was messing with, that kept her hands busy and had the presence of mind not to make her brother feel like he was cornered.

"Might've stopped the treatment because o' me," he started slowly, and just like that, it was like the river had broken its banks, like the stream was rushing towards the ocean, and all the words were tumbling down Mickey's mouth at extreme speed, Mandy finding herself having trouble to follow the whole development. "He was recovering, and somehow he gave everythin' up, because of something I said or something I did, and now it's worse, it's so much worse, it's like he's manic all the time, or depressed, just overall,  _unhappy_ , and I don't want him to be-- He's saying all that crap 'bout being broken or whatever, and I don't get it, I don't get it 'cause he's not! he's good, you know? he's good, he's alright, and now he's just fucked up because o' me."

Mandy lost it at the change of pronouns, which is to say, right from the beginning. "Who's he? What does he have to d--"

"Also, I fucked him," Mickey said under his breath, his voice so small Mandy thought she caught it wrong.

She looked up at Mickey in the eye, and understood that was exactly what he had said. He was seconds away from losing it, like a Milkovich never does in public, like she never saw him do; he was blinking and sniffing and rubbing his hand against his nose, his eyes flickering everywhere in panic. And just like that, she got it. He was terrified. And she couldn't blame him, in the Milkovich house of horrors, with the constant threat of their father swaying above their heads, to be terrified.

So Mickey was coming out.

But what about Mandy? Mandy had always been here for her brother. They had grown up separately, him playing gangster while her was trying to grope her way to be a girl in the Milkovich house, because that was how things had been, but she had _never_ failed him. She had been here to take some of his detentions for him, in junior high, she had been here to visit him when he was in juvie, and, even after she moved to Indiana, she had been here to sort some of the fights that had opposed her brothers. She always thought they had each other's back.

She was furious that he had been hiding this from her. Not because Mickey was gay--so he was gay, so what? big fucking deal--but because it hurt to know now that he never said a thing about it, ever, for over two fucking decades. It was like she had assumed all her life that an unspoken contract linked them both, where they had to be true to each other because the world was already bad enough with them, because they needed each other, and while she'd always been true to Mickey, he'd always been keeping this secret, a secret huge like a fucking mountain on top of that, from her.

It was not like she would have expected him to talk about the boys they liked, paint their nails or braid their hair or anything. Mandy wasn't asking for any of this bullshit. But she would have liked to know, hell, she could have _helped_. She knew how it felt to carry a heavy, crushing secret she only trusted her brother with, and she could have helped.

She was angry that she hadn't noticed, too.

She felt her hands curl into a fist, her vision turning blurry, and while any normal sibling would have hugged Mickey to comfort him, told him how they felt, that was not how things were done in the dysfunctional Milkovich house, and Mandy punched him hard in the arm.

"I don't give a fuck 'bout who you bang!" she screamed in his face, hearing how fucking creaky her own voice sounded. "You coud've fucked any guys you want, I'd never've given a shit! I get it that you flip the fuck out in this house to admit out lout, but seriously, Mickey?! Trust your fuckin' sister once in a while, before you do stupid shit! What did you think? That just 'cause you fuck guys, I'd have left you to deal with your own shit alone?  _Please_!"

"I'm not a fag," Mickey croaked.

"Fuck you, Mickey! And fuck me for being so fuckin' blind!"

"Dad will kill him if he finds out," Mickey said softly. He was thinking about the guy's security over his own. Mandy then realized how deep he was into it.

" _Fuck_  Dad," she replied aggressively, shaking herself out of her thoughts. "Why d'ya have to be to fuckin' dramatic! You won't stay here forever, Mickey. Fuck, why do you think I left in the first place? You're a grown-ass man and you can do whatever the fuck you want, and  _fuck you_  if you're not fuckin' able to go talk to that guy and tell him what's wrong. He's not in your head, Mickey. He doesn't know what you think. Fuckin' man up! S'not fuckin' over, you're fuckin' dead, and this guy isn't dead either, so have some dignity for yourself and go tell him what you feel!"

"Wha' fuckin' world do you live in, Mandy?!" Mickey yelled, looking just as crushed as his sister. "He can't be anyone right now. Would fuck him up even more. I'm nothing like the stable relationship he needs... I don't wanna fuck him up even more."

Mandy didn't know she could still do this at age twenty, but apparently, yes she could. She reached over and took a handful of her brother's hair, pulling it hard enough to make him yelp. Mickey tried to stand up but tripped over her legs and fell back onto the couch, so he changed tactics and pulled her own hair. She bit his arm several times, hard, and they struggled like that for a little while, Mandy clawing her way to her brother's face to scratch him, and Mickey trying to push her aside, both breathing hard and swearing.

Eventually, after a particularly hard slap on her hand, Mandy let go of her brother with a curse and Mickey collapsed against the back of the couch, trying to wind back.

Her brother's level of stupidity was incredible. He had finally found someone he loved, and who apparently loved him back, and everything was shit if he wasn't going to take this opportunity to be loved the amount they always deserved, and never got. Deciding he got the lesson, and not because she was tired as fuck by the fight, _thank you very much_ , she shifted against him, and he let her, accommodating to give her the room to settle her head against his chest.

"Asstwat." 

"Fuckhead," she managed to mumble, before her eyelids, heavy with fatigue and alcohol and weed, fell back over her eyes.

 

***

 

" _Mickey Milkovich!_ "

Mickey didn't know how he expected to be woken up, but Richa standing in front of him, in his house, at four in the afternoon, was not it. He shut his eyes close, figuring his brain was playing a trick on him, 'cause  _c'mon_ , Richa's never mad.

"What the fuck, Mickey!"

Okay. So she might indeed be mad. Richa being in the house was one thing; her being  _mad_  at him was yet an entirely different concept. Mickey had always seen her as a model of self-control, and he had never heard her talk to him, or anyone really, with so much animosity. He tried to rise from his spot on the couch, noticing Mandy went missing, his limbs sore because of the uncomfortable furniture and weird position he'd slept in.

"What the fuck!" Richa repeated, infuriated. "Just because he's bipolar doesn't mean he isn't worth a relationship, Mickey!"

Mickey squeezed his eyes shut, wondering if he was hallucinating. But when he opened them back, Richa was still there, small yet threatening, her arms waving in every directions around her. Looking quickly over his shoulder, Mickey saw Mandy leaning against the door frame. She probably let her in, and she apparently agreed because she kept a stiff upper lip, all the while she stared at Mickey.

"I never said he wasn't worth a relationship," Mickey said slowly, turning back to Richa with a frown. "I said I wasn't anything like the stable relationship he needs to have right now."

"Not only does he deserves someone who'll love him and treat him right, much like anyone else does, but he also deserves so much more, because trust me, the reason why your schedule is so empty is because there are very few people brave enough to attend therapy for the third time!" She shoved him hard on the shoulder, making him fall back onto the couch. "You will apologize!"

"Are you listenin'?" Mickey asked in disbelief. It might be four, it was still too early for this shit. "And gimme a fuckin' second!"

"You'll have all the seconds you want in the car. I'm going to the clinic, and you're coming with me," Richa pressed and came closer to shove him hard on the shoulder. "What we're asking of Ian is way harder than what you have to do.  _You_  give yourself the means to be a stable partner."

With that, she shared a look with Mandy, and went back out, probably to run the engine, leaving a barely awaken Mickey and his sister in the room. They heard her yell "IN THE CAR, NOW!" from there, and looking at each other, they unexpectedly burst out laughing.

"How did she find the house?" Mickey asked after his giggling fit, holding his ribs which hurt where Mandy had kicked him earlier.

"Called her," Mandy said, herself recovering from her own giggles. "You saved her as 'Therapy Bitch' so she was pretty easy to find."

Mickey felt bad now that he remembered it. But the joke was on him, now that her sister had sneaked into his phone, found her number, and called her to get his ass kicked. She was right though, he came to realize.

"How much did you tell her?"

"Enough for you to move to the clinic and do somethin' about your sorry ass."

"...yeah, well I'm still a bit high," Mickey confessed, and cracked a smile.

"Will make things easier," Mandy replied and tossed his phone next to him on the couch. "Now time get your shit together, Mickey."

Maybe the weed made it clearer. Or prevented all of his psychological repression or whatever. It seemed just so  _obvious_. He needed to see Ian so badly. Mickey gathered his stuff, and headed to the door, flicking his sister off by way of thank you.

 

***

 

The secretary barely resisted to hug him tight, when Ian arrived at the clinic. Before he could even vocalize the reason of his visit, she urged him to wait in the waiting room, promising she wouldn't take more than twenty minutes to be back.

Ian assumed that she went to tell Mickey he was here, even though she didn't say so, and almost wanted to thank her for it. He settled on one of the empty chairs, next to an old lady who didn't answer when he politely greeted her. It took him a little while to realize the strange noise he was hearing since he got there wasn't the air-conditioner, but her snoring.

Ian quickly realized he had no interest in the magazines he tried to read to pass the time, he just wanted to see Mickey and apologize for last night. His feelings for Mickey had taken the better part of him before he could do something about them, like block them, and he felt like a scumbag because he didn't even know if Mickey had done it as a consented act, or if Mickey had done it out of (and the word hurt him so much he barely thought about it; or at least tried not to) _pity_.

Last night, though, hadn't been like the nights he'd spent at the White Swallow, had nothing to do with the guys he had fucked for the sake of feeling human's warmth around him, the need to be wanted, desired. He'd really felt something else with Mickey, something deeper, something _shared_.

But maybe it was all in his head. His head playing a trick on him as always. When Fiona had woken him up in the morning, the first thing she had asked was whether something wrong had happened with Mickey. She didn't go much into the details, but it was obvious to Ian that Mickey had freaked out in the morning, when he woke up beside him.

There was no way in the world Ian wanted this  _whatever_ he had with Mickey to end, but the last thing he wanted to do was corner, or force Mickey to do anything. So, the next best thing to do was probably to come to his office and apologize.

But as he glanced at the clock, forty minutes after the secretary had left and still without any news from her nor Mickey, just sitting in companionable (almost) silence next to the old lady, Ian took it as a pretty obvious response that Mickey didn't want to have anything to do with him anymore, despite Richa's intervention in his favor.

Ian snapped his fingers in front of the lady's face, but she wasn't waking up. On the contrary, her snores rose in volume. He stood up and risked an eye in the corridor.

He knew the office all too well; he'd been in all three consultation rooms. Dr Peckham's was the last one he'd been in, before Mickey's and christ wasn't she a massive bitch. He un-hanged his own drawing, behind the secretary's desk, and slipped in the office across Pisapio's, where Mickey's lame nametag still wasn't hanging quite straight.

It was weird how Mickey's office smelled like, well, Mickey. It smelled good. Not cologne-good, but a delicate scent of body wash and paper, and tissue. Ian looked around the bare walls, pondering on how close he'd been to finally, after all this time, all those failures, actually, make it, attend all the sessions.

Not bothering to come around the desk, he picked up one of the pens in the mug in front of him and started scribbling a few words on the verso of his drawing for the attention of Mickey when he'll come back. Because he'll have to come back, at one point, once he was sure Ian was away, Ian thought bitterly. Unsatisfied by the nonsense he was writing, he barred the words right after writing them.

The noise of a door slamming startled him, probably the front door, and he hardly had time to process what was happening before Mickey's office was yanked open and Mickey was holding the knob to steady himself, panting like he'd run the marathon.

"Mickey, I didn't m—" is all Ian could produce before the older man was closing the distance between the two of them, grabbing both sides of Ian's neck, and pressing a clumsy, messy kiss hard on his lips.

It took .2 seconds all together for Ian to decide to respond to the kiss, tilting his head and cradling Mickey's neck with one hand on the back of his head to reach the perfect angle, gripping Mickeys hip around his back with the other to keep him closer. Mickey slid one arm over Ian's shoulders, letting him guide the kiss, granting access to his tongue, doing whatever he wanted of him, his fingers twisting in the material of Ian's shirt, while he kept stroking his cheek with his thumb.

"Mi—" Ian started when they came up for air, without letting go of each other, before being cut off yet again by Mickey.

"Ian," Mickey muttered against his lips, then pressed their foreheads together, and Ian could have sworn his eyes were teary if his own vision wasn't blurry, "you need to take your medication."

"I hate 'em, Mickey, don't make me take 'em," Ian heard himself whine.

"I know you do. It'll take time, but they're the only thing that'll fix this."

Ian felt so irritated at those words he didn't even watch the volume of voice when he burst out, gripping even more tightly at Mickey's body, "They can't fix me! There's nothing to be fixed, okay! I'm me! I don't wanna be fixed! I'm not broken!"

"Maybe I'm a bit broken too."

Mickey shut his eyes close and Ian felt like crumbling at the defeated tone. There was tons of things Ian didn't know about Mickey, he realized. Yet, hearing him admit his flaws out loud while Ian had hardly ever acknowledged his own made him want to smack Mickey in the face, because this was  _so_  not true. Mickey was the only one who'd made him feel alive those last few months.

"Hey. Listen, Ian," Mickey said lowly, softly tapping their foreheads together, "I don't want you to take this medication because I want you to change. I don't want you to change, Ian. I want you to take it because I want you to be able to decide  _whether or not_  you want to change. I want you to give yourself the means to decide who you want to be. Who you  _are_. Not who you are forced to be. This disease, Ian— this disease does not define you. What you'll do with your future, what you want to be... This is what defines you."

"I can't do it, Mick, I really ca—"

Mickey shushed him with a kiss, then stared into his eyes, back at grabbing both sides of his face, his blue orbs flickering alternatively between his eyes, and Ian felt like they could read into his soul. "I'll be with you, okay. I'll stay with you, and it's going to be fine."

Ian shook his head, feeling his knees go weak and shifting some of his weigh on the table behind him, slowly entangling himself from Mickey. "You don't have to do this. I'm not a charity case or whatever. Don't— I don't need your pity."

Mickey grabbed Ian's wrist to uphold him, and pressed his lips against Ian's in what had to be the sweetest, most tender kiss Ian ever received from anyone in his entire life. He heard the whine that came from his own throat as Mickey pulled out and didn't even think of stopping himself before draping his arm around Mickey's shoulder, craving his touch, pressed against the solid weigh of the table behind him, and Mickey.

"You think I'd break seventy two rules or so just for _pity_?"

Ian frowned. "What rules?"

"You're still my patient, man. It's not like I'm supposed to make out with you."

Ian felt a smile pull his lips, and it triggered the most beautiful feeling in his insides, like someone, no, a group of happy people, was improvising trumpet and saxophone and fucking triangle in his stomach. He nuzzled his face in the crook of Mickey's neck, because he liked it so much there, it felt so warm and comforting, smiling against the skin. "Since when do you care about work ethics?"

"You want me to lose my job?" Mickey asked with feigned disbelief, and Ian didn't even have to look up to know his eyebrows had shot up.

"I want you to let me fuck you," Ian muttered against the skin and smiled even more when Mickey gasped. He trailed kisses up Mickey's neck, and took advantage of the fact that Mickey had parted his lips to fit his own in between, planting a deep kiss there. Mickey's full lips were so soft Ian idly thought he might become an addict real quick. He reluctantly pulled out before he could suffocate the both of them. "You taste like pot," he said, narrowing his eyes suspiciously.

Mickey bit his lip sheepishly at that and Ian got immediately distracted by his mouth, sliding his hands back up to grasp streams of hair, tilting his head back and nipping at his lip. Mickey moaned softly in his mouth, eyes closed tightly, giving up to Ian so  _easily_ that Ian felt his heartbeat go full crazy. It was so weird how perfectly they fitted together, like they belonged with each other, and it was nothing if a reassurance of what Ian had felt the night before.

"I'm sorry to interrupt something so charming," a voice ringed behind them, and they parted so quickly Mickey nearly tripped over his own legs, "but Mickey, what a surprise. You're not supposed to work on Thursdays. Hello, Ian."

"Hi, Dr Peckham," Ian said shyly at the bonny silhouette staring down at them, and nudged Mickey in the ribs when he started to laugh. He had been so caught up by the kisses he had even forgot where they were.

"Sorry Sil, we're not gonna bother you any longer with our happiness," Mickey replied and Ian definitely felt himself go red at the mention of  _our happiness_ , "we're leavin'."

And it went like a dream.

They took the train together, and Mickey led him to his house, Ian discovering they'd practically been neighbors from the start. He met his sister there, and she looked like the female version of Mickey, and Ian was sure they could get along pretty quick.

She hugged him so tight he thought he was going to choke, and they shared some weed and drank beer while she told them about the dumb fucks she had met in Indiana, like it was the most normal thing to do. Ian had never felt more at ease with anyone; because he'd never been treated so normally by anyone.

When Ian finally collapsed on the bed next to Mickey, he wasn't even sure all of this was real. He touched Mickey's face for confirmation, and Mickey smiled lazily at him, and how could Mickey think for a second that Ian would be able to resist that smile? Pulling the blankets up and over them, he touched him, kissed him in every way he could, until they fell asleep in each other's arms.

Limbs entangled and nose deeply buried in the crook of Mickey's neck, Ian seriously started to believe in this way out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> writing the boys happy after so much angst is the best feeling ever I swear
> 
> sorry for this extra-long chapter! sorry that I kept you waiting that long to post it, too. It's an important!! chapter for the story, which is why I didn't want to screw it up. I hope you enjoyed nonetheless! only one more chapter left, and then, that's the epilogue. LEMME KNOW WHAT YOU THOUGHT ABOUT IT /grabby hands
> 
> 'sides, I know I already said it like, over a thousand time already, but thank you so much for giving this story a chance--thank you thank you THANK YOU ♥


	7. the day after that

Ian thought about bringing breakfast to bed, but decided against the idea the very second it popped in his head. He was afraid it might spook Mickey. They could do that another time, later, because they _had time_  now. Around eleven o'clock, when he heard water running in the bathroom from his spot in the kitchen, Ian knew Mickey was finally up and would join him any minute now.

When he made it to the kitchen, all sleepy and perfect, Ian wondered in panic if there was going to be a some kind of awkwardness between them due to last night, but instead, Mickey put his chin on his shoulder, and watched him cook eggs for the both of them.

Feeling bold, Ian spun round and pressed his lips against Mickey's in something that was too short and mouth-closed to be a proper kiss, but definitely too long just to be a peck. Before he could leave it there, Mickey looped his arms around his shoulders and prevented him from pulling away, going straight for the french kiss, fresh smell of mint toothpaste filling his mouth as the kiss deepened.

"Hope you don't mind me using your kitchen," Ian muttered against Mickey's lips when they parted, putting the hand that was not holding the spatula on the small of his back. "Just making breakfast."

"Breakfast sounds nice," Mickey began and pecked at Ian's lips, "but you know what sounds even better? you keeping your promise and fuck me?"

Ian pulled out slightly, genuinely shocked by the demand. "Right now?"

"Right now sounds about right, yeah."

"You mean like morning sex?"

Mickey seemed taken aback by the response, looking suddenly sullen and embarrassed. "That a thing?"

"No," Ian lied quickly, and that was a lie because he'd never had morning sex with a person he had just started dating (christ, he hoped that's what they were doing, it was not like he could actually _ask_ Mickey to _label_ it), it was just way too intimate. So yeah, it was kind of a thing.

But then, the better part of him figured he wouldn't mind morning sex with Mickey. That was a brilliant idea, even. Besides, they had already had sex in his room, so it wasn't like it was a first. "No, it's not. But you'll have to let me eat if you want me to be at my best."

Mickey yawned and came around Ian to make coffee, accepting the deal without vocalizing it.

When they crawled back into bed, Ian couldn't help noticing that Mickey was still wearing his shirt, that he probably took in mistake for his own when he woke up in the Gallagher house the day before. He wondered whether Mickey even remembered whose shirt it was. Taking him in, he decided he loved seeing it, a bit loose on Mickey's shoulders, and, knowing he wouldn't mind not taking it back ever, didn't say a word about it. He liked seeing Mickey's bare chest even more though, so he got rid of the shirt and started kissing and nipping all the patches of skin he could reach.

Mickey hissed, then relaxed, and Ian found himself getting hard just looking at him, spread out on the bed under him, granting him full access without question, like he trusted Ian with all his being.

They grinded against each other, Ian reveling in the sounds he managed to drag out of Mickey (quiet sighs for the most part) but not quite satisfied to finish him like that. He trailed kisses down Mickey's torso, playing with the elastic of his boxers with his hand, which made Mickey chuckle above him. He took it as his cue to keep going with the teasing. Unable to resist the urge, he planted a kiss on Mickey's lips and went back down, kissed his left inner thigh and nipped at his hipbone, then, at the skin that was covered by his boxers, above his groin.

"Get rid of this fuckin' thing already," Mickey breathed bossily and it was Ian's turn to chuckle. He wasn't about to complain, though. He grabbed both sides of the boxers and slid them down Mickey's legs, revealing his cock, hard and waving a little at its releasing. The boxers were still around his ankles but Ian forgot all of that as he leaned in to take Mickey in his mouth.

Mickey gasped and tensed up, like he hadn't seen this coming, and it spurred Ian on sucking, loving the warmth and weight of Mickey's cock in his mouth. Loving his taste. He grabbed him with one hand, and started tonguing quickly at the underside, then on the top, until he could taste precome.

His hand on the mattress was unexpectedly covered by Mickey's. "Not that I'm not enjoying this, trust me," he panted, "but would you fucking get on me, _please_?"

Oh, Ian couldn't have complied quicker.

Mickey was a bottom, which was one of the greatest news he'd heard in days. He wouldn't have minded to bottom for him, if he had had to, but it was making him feel all hot to know he'd be the one filling him up, the one feeling his warmth around him. The one seeing him fall apart under him.

Resting one elbow next to Mickey's face, Ian kissed him hungrily as he gently guided his legs around his hips, kept kissing him as he slipped a finger inside him, but he pulled away when Mickey winced against his lips at the dryness.

"Where's the lube? And condom?" he asked right away, not wanting to hurt him. Mickey pointed at the nightstand and Ian somehow managed to roll towards it and open the drawer without entangling themselves.

Mickey prepped himself, sliding one, then two fingers in and out, while Ian stroked himself to full hardness and rolled the condom on his cock, all the while staring at Mickey's hand. He wanted to be the one prepping him, anytime soon.

He poured some lube on his dick, guided it right against Mickey's entrance, and slowly, so slowly it almost hurt, he slid inside Mickey's hole, watching alternatively his dick getting swallowed by such a great ass, and Mickey's expression as he pushed deeper into him, how hard he was biting on his lower lip, eyes squeezed shut. How his body was arching up against the mattress towards him. Ian thanked god for letting him fuck Mickey face to face, in the light at last, where he could see his face and expressions clearly, because this had got to be the hottest thing ever.

When he was balls-deep into Mickey, he rolled his hips slowly, satisfied with the slow, tortuous pace. It was morning sex after all. He wasn't exactly expecting his thoughts to come out loud when he breathed, "fuck, Mick, you're so _tight_."

Mickey opened his eyes at that, looking at him with his lazy smile. "People talking during sex are unattractive."

"Yeah?"

That was all it took for Ian. He started slamming quicker and harder against Mickey's ass, up to the point when the brunet couldn't refrain the grunts tumbling down his mouth that he vainly tried to stifle.

"Beg me and we'll see if you're unattractive," Ian breathed. He leaned over and joined their lips, tangling their tongues together, and Mickey clenched his hands in the sheets above him as they resumed the fucking, his hips meeting Ian's thrusts in rhythm. "Beg me, Mick."

" _Ian!_ " Mickey cried out, after Ian slightly changed the angle, his muscles tautening dangerously. Ian figured he'd found his sweet spot, so he kept doing it again, while Mickey was still panting his name in the breathiest, sexiest way.

And he started to beg. It was just a breathy plea at first, that Ian thought he was imagining, but then, Mickey's hands were grasping at his hips, his nails surely leaving marks there, and he was begging him to go faster, deeper, fucking _please, Ian please._

Ian felt so light-headed by the pleasure he almost forgot to take care of Mickey's dick. Remembering it at last, he reached down between them and started jerking him off. A tickle in his stomach clued him that he was very close to his climax, mostly, he guessed in a blur, because of the view he had of the gorgeous boy falling apart.

But Mickey spilled in his hand before he could reach it completely, pulsating around him, and it pushed Ian over the edge too, his vision turning white as he wrapped his hands around Mickey's wrists, whose hands were still firm on his hips to keep him grounded over his last jolts.

 

***

 

Mickey didn't know exactly what being a _stable partner_ meant, but he had decided to become one the moment Richa had said it to him. There was a lot to work on, obviously.

"I'm Milk- I'm a Milkovich," was the first thing he told Ian when the redhead was getting dressed, because he figured it probably had to start somewhere with his real identity, and it definitely came out shakier that he would have liked it. He leaned against the doorframe, peering at Ian's reaction with an uneasy anticipation spiraling down his stomach.

But when Ian looked at him, his face was blank. "Means you're allergic to milk? There're some substitutes, man."

Mickey frowned at that, because _damn_ , Ian could be such an idiot. "Nah I mean, my name. My name's Milkovich. Not Straits or whatever."

"Ah," Ian replied with a brief nod, and went back at lacing his shoes, "that. Yeah, I know."

Mickey must have looked just as gobsmacked as he felt, because Ian huffed out a laugh when he eyed him up. "What do you mean, you know?" Mickey asked, searching his memory for a freckled boy somewhere who could have been Ian. Found nothing.

Ian stood up, and tilted his head to the side. "We were in Little League together."

Mickey opened his mouth. Frowned. "No, we were not."

"Yeah, we were. You pissed on first base."

" _Jesus fuck_ ," Mickey scowled, and rolled his eyes, while Ian was searching the floor for his shirt and jacket, "is that _really_ all what people remember? I was a fuckin' good player, too, for your information."

Ian's dumb smile only grew wider. "Well, you got dismissed after that, so how should I know?"

"Yeah, beat up a couple of kids there too," Mickey said with nostalgia, his head resting against the wall. He suddenly cocked it the other way. "I can't believe I never saw you, though. You must've been a killer player with all these muscles."

"You like my muscles?" Ian asked, looking over his shoulder with a grin and Mickey waved the question away. Like, did Ian _really_ wonder that. "I was a little... smaller at the time. Spent most of my time sitting on the bench, to be honest. Little League sucked for me."

Mickey nodded, absorbed in the sight of Ian's back as he was busy putting his retrieved jacket on. A little, chubby, freckled Ian worked for him.

"Don't worry, though. Took me a while to place you. You were familiar from the start, but I didn't remember where I'd seen you. I didn't know you were living so close to my house either. Guess I'd have seen you a lot more if we were in the same school."

"Probably were. My teachers didn't get the chance to meet me so much either."

Ian scoffed, facing Mickey and readjusting his collar. "The chance? Get over yourself, man."

Mickey clicked his tongue at that, but didn't stop the smile that pulled his lips. "Weren't you supposed to go?"

"I'm sorry," Ian said with a feigned outraged expression, "are you trying to throw me outside?"

"You're going to forget your bag, and apparently yes I have to 'cause you're still here."

Ian squinted his eyes playfully at Mickey and grabbed his bag off the floor, searching for his phone inside of it. He looked at the screen and rubbed a tired hand over his face, all enthusiasm gone.

"Gotta have a proper conversation with them," he sighed. "They think I freaked out again."

"You want me to come with?" Mickey asked, guessing Ian was talking about his family. He wasn't too keen to come with and to face the Gallagher tribe, but that really was the least he could do. What a _stable partner_ would do.

Jesus, Mandy and Richa'd better be fucking proud of him.

"Nah man, it's fine," Ian replied. "I just need to talk to them. This was long overdue anyway."

"Okay," Mickey said quietly.

Ian looked around to make sure he didn't forget anything, and made his way towards the door.

"Call me when you're done, or whatever. Maybe we could, like, hang out, or whatever," Mickey risked when Ian was about to cross the doorstep, a feeling of embarrassment rushing through him as he said it. Ian's face was unreadable. It made his blood run cold. "Or don't, I mean, you don't owe me anything."

"But," Ian started slowly, and Mickey felt like a fifteen year-old chick when he started having goose-bumps, scared shitless that Ian would give him a rejection, "I don't have your number."

"Oh."

First, name, then, number. That made sense, for a stable relationship.

Mickey typed his number on Ian's phone while Ian was doing the same on his own, and when they exchanged their phones again, Ian bowed his head and kissed him softly on the lips. "I'm calling you," he murmured, and left a cherry-red Mickey standing in his bedroom, trying not to freak out about the fact that he'd just been kissed by the boy he was badly crushing on.

A lot to work on, indeed.

 

***

 

Ian did call, and now they were laying on the ground on the empty lot next to Ian's house, freezing to death in the late February evening. That was of course the reasoning behind Mickey's actions when got closer to Ian, their sides almost touching completely. It had Ian smiling when he got the movement, and Mickey felt instantly a lot warmer.

"So, how did it go?" he risked, not looking at him so as not to pressure him in answering.

Ian sighed. "Well, could've been worse. My older brother was here." He chuckled a bit and added, "man, you'd hate him."

"Yeah?"

"Oh, yeah."

Mickey started laughing, too. He could imagine that. He hated a lot of people after all.

"I think my little brother likes you, though."

"Yeah? He seems like a fun kid."

"He's such a pain in the ass. You two will love each other."

"Pain in the ass... you're one to talk," Mickey said with a scoff and nudged him in the ribs. Ian rolled his eyes and decided to ignore the unsubtle innuendo. Mickey rolled his head towards him, seeing him smile like a dumb kid. It felt perfect, being with him like that, watching him be happy about little things. But Mickey could tell Ian was on a high phase, and that it wasn't going to last forever. He hated the fact that he had to be the one bringing it back up. But, he knew he also _had_ to. "Man, I know you don't wanna hear this, b--"

"Yeah, I know. I'll get back on the meds."

He propped himself up on his elbows and looked down at Mickey. "But before, just... give me a night, that's like, a night to remember. Like, a sort of bachelor party or something." Mickey looked at him in perfect confusion. "You gotta give me somethin', man," Ian sighed in frustration. He fell back on his back. "There'll be tons of things I won't be able or allowed to do once I'll be back on the meds. Like, get drunk, smoke--hell, I'll even be fucking impotent again. I want to, like, _do_ those things one last time."

He squirmed and they fell silent.

"I've got two things to tell you, though," Mickey said, breaking the silence that was threatening to settle back between them. He might as well get it over with. Ian had been honest with him, it was his turn to be. Maybe it'd change things between them. Ian pivoted his head so he could look at him, but Mickey stared at the sky, his eyes avoiding him consciously as he blurted out, "I'm not a real therapist."

To Mickey's surprise, Ian almost outright burst out laughing. "You don't fucking say."

"Since when d'you know?" he asked, recovering from his surprise, a scowl making its way up his face at his obviousness. Of fucking course Ian knew. Ian could read in Mickey like in a book.

"When I found out that we were practically the same age, and that you were the one who piss—"

"For fuck's sake, Ian."

"—ed on first base, well, then, I figured it all out. So, around the fourth session, or the third maybe?"

"What else than Little League clued you?" Mickey asked without missing a beat, with the great intention of erasing whatever features Ian would point out to avoid being fired anytime soon.

"Your age, really," and when Mickey remained silent, he added slyly, "what does your resume say? That you're, what, 27?"

Ian chuckled softly and a warm feeling spread through Mickey's veins as his body was shaken a little bit by Ian, beside him. He managed to make Ian laugh, which had got to be one of the greatest life's achievements. Using all his resources, he managed to pull an offended face anyway, "What, you questionin' my resume?"

Ian closed his eyes and dropped his head on Mickey's shoulder. "Wouldn't risk it, tough guy."

Mickey didn't know when he stopped breathing, but he definitely did, because he was coming short on air. "What else, then?" he went on, ignoring, or at least trying to ignore pointedly the fact that Ian's head was on his shoulder and that it was making his heart pound in his chest like a fucking prepubescent teenager.

"The way you do therapy," Ian answered softly, and that, Mickey couldn't deny it was a give away. Especially for those who had already been in the system before, like Ian, and like all of his patients, really. He wondered how many of them knew, too, until Ian cut him off in his thoughts. "So, what's the second thing?"

Mickey swallowed. "My father's a raging homophobic."

Ian only hummed in acknowledgment. "Heard rumors about the Milkovich father being a white supremacist, but from sources that were variously trustworthy. Guess it was all true then?"

"Yeah. He's ru- he's out of town right now. I don't want us," he shivered at the pronoun, "I don't want us to stop doing what we're doing, but I want you to know that things will be different when he'll be back--which can be anytime now. We'll have to be discreet, or whatever. If he finds out, we're dead, and I'd quite prefer it if that didn't happen."

"Funny how quickly night falls," Ian commented, changing the subject completely, but Mickey knew he'd listen. Knew he was disappointed, too.

Mickey had his heart stuck in his throat. He wanted to give Ian what he wanted. "Mandy's leaving in a few day. Said she's gotta head back to Indiana by Thursday 'cause she works. She'll probably leave on Wednesday. We could do something, then," Mickey proposed then. "Your bachelor party."

"On a Wednesday? How ironic," Ian said slowly, and all of a sudden, he was beaming. "Yeah. Yeah, I'd really like that."

"Okay. Let's make it a night to remember then."

Ian briefly squeezed Mickey's hand in his own, and rolled to his side to nuzzle his nose in Mickey's hair before pulling away, and that was the closest they could get to a mark of affection in this neighborhood, though they were alone. Mickey went red, sheepish that it made him feel so good to feel wanted, maybe even _loved_ (even though he wouldn't let himself think that too loud, in case someone would try and steal this love from him).

"Yeah. Let's do that."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know I'm a fulfilled human being when I can put 'Fluff and Smut' in the tags. /content sigh
> 
> sorry that I had to cut the chapter in half, it was too long!! this time, for real, next chapter is the last chapter and then, that's the epilogue. once again, because I feel like it's been too long since I last said it (and these notes are already too long anyway), sorry for slaughtering the beautiful English language. every time I reread a passage, I find new mistakes that throw me into despair--how annoying must that be for you.
> 
> also, don't think Mickey and Ian never showered between Wednesday and, well, the end of Friday. I think Ian showered on both Tuesday and Friday mornings, and Mickey showered somewhere during Tuesday afternoon and on Friday morning, when Ian left his house. I don't know why, but this was seriously starting to bug me. Now that you know they're not dirty, filthy, nasty characters who never shower, I do feel better.
> 
> hope you enjoyed, and thank you!!!


	8. last session

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I could not not post the chapter after today's great news (finally something bright in those dark days!) so it may have taken me the night and the better of the day but it was all worth it! well done, USA. Happy Marriage Equality Day, everyone! may it spread to the rest of the world c:
> 
> (ps, couldn't help the reference!)

If anyone asked, Mickey would deny the fact that he just spent the best twenty-four hours of his life sitting at home with his sister and, what appeared to be, his boyfriend (pleasantly weird label, that Mickey wouldn't let linger too long in his mind for his own sanity).

Eating pizzas, playing video games and talking shit with the house all for themselves had never been so good.

There were lots of moments Mickey would easily pretend didn't happen (like the one when Mandy and Ian got him to watch fucking _Catwoman_ , of all things), but the one part he'd deny the most would be without question when he came along with Mandy's stupid idea to play hide and seek. He would never have, but shit got instantly personal when bitch called him a shitty hider.

They got Ian to settle this down, and needless to say he found Mandy first, rolled like a ball in the washing machine (bitched for half the rest of the day about the pain that dumb position ensued), while Mickey was hiding in one of the recess in the damn ceiling.

Next round, she found them both making out under the bed (Mickey knew how amateur of him going for under the bed was—though this shit's seriously underrated 'cause it's already half a bitch to get there—but he had a feeling Ian wanted this moment to be a us-moment, and Mickey couldn't blame him because as much as he loved his sister, she was unintentionally being kind of a cockblocker), made a disgusted sound and called it a day.

Whatever remaining, fleeting feeling of happiness that was left in Mickey's system when he woke up on Monday morning vanished almost entirely as soon as he heard three dry knocks on his office door, and Mickey didn't know knocks could be dry until Boris proved it was a thing. That noise was invariably the warning sign of some bad time of it.

He wished he heard wrong, but then Boris appeared on the doorstep, without being invited, and Mickey's head rolled back. He shrank in his chair, one arm folded with his head resting on his hand, tapping his pen patiently on the crossword he got in the free newspaper. MTV reality series, seven letters.

"Do I have to remind you, Michael, that you work on Fridays?"

 _Jackass_.

"Maybe we should re-discuss your schedule, Michael," Boris went on, with a bright smile that didn't seem fake at all, "Thursdays? You don't work. Fridays? You do. Funny, because you never showed up on Friday, but Silvana told me she saw you—and Gallagher—on Thursday."

Mickey arched one eyebrow, though he still wouldn't look at the therapist, scribbling the so on point answer instead, as Boris was ostensibly leaning against the door frame. While the smug little shit was spreading himself out in Mickey's office as though he thought it was fine to just talk to him like he was a five year old, or a ninety year old senile granny.

Luckily, Boris was more stupid than an actual threat, and Mickey couldn't bring himself to really care. "Hilarious indeed," he said under his breath. He was done telling Boris his name was not Michael. If anything, his name was Mykhaylo, but he'd rather have this piece of shit call him a name that's totally not his anyway.

"I don't really think you're in the position to talk to me like this, Michael."

This time, Mickey looked up and laughed upfront, a genuine, short laugh. "I'm not in the position to do wha', Boris?" he asked, all eyebrows raised and smirk in place, watching with delight the way Boris's face fell.

"Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. It shouldn't be that hard. Don't make me put up that badging thing again, it's a pain for everyone," Boris mumbled, now fidgeting against the wall. "All I'm saying is, you don't get paid to have sex in the workplace."

"You and Sil are?"

"You mean Silvana?" He was both shocked and disgusted, his eyes round like saucers, and for once, Mickey couldn't blame him. He shook his head, his stupid fringe banging on the sides of his face. "No, thanks."

_Fuck, I knew it, Rich's gonna be so disappointed when I tell her._

"Yeah okay, whatever," he said after giving up on trying to explain how he'd become so gossipy because of his coworker. He gazed back down at his crossword. "What's bunting foul with two strikes in three letters?"

"I'm serious, Michael. Today's meeting is cancelled, but if you keep messing this up, I'll have you fired. I don't care about whatever is going on with you or where you come from. We can't afford to have one doctor missing when there's dozens of patients waiting to be taken care of. You can't keep this up."

Mickey fell against the back of the chair, sighed, and stood up, the chair scraping on the floor. He came around the desk and eyed Boris up and down. The therapist was taller than him, but in this instant, he actually seemed ridiculously smaller than Mickey.

"Yeah, wouldn't look too much into it, if I were you." The only reason why Boris was playing tough was because he didn't know _what was going on_ with Mickey, or _where he came from_ , precisely. Even Mickey wasn't making too much of a braggart in front of his father. " _Out_."

Boris looked like he could wet his pants in this moment. Mickey rolled his eyes and changed plans before he could move, walking past him, taking a cigarette out of his pack on his way to the elevator.

"Mickey! Mickey, wait!"

Richa's voice had him spinning around before he could open the door that led to the rest of the clinic, and to the elevator.

Her tiny legs tried to close the distance between them. She looked in a constant state of business, and today was apparently no exception. She was holding a fixed-line telephone, old model, with the wire uncoiled to her feet and probably across the waiting room behind her, a panicked expression plastered on her face.

She shook the receiver in front of Mickey's face. "Just called Lady Olivia and Julio and they both told me they attended their sessions?? But," she glanced at her notebook, stuck between her side and her arm, "they're scheduled on Friday, I think? And you weren't there on Friday?"

"Yeah, something came up." _Ian_ came up. "Had to be somewhere on Friday, but yeah, they got their sessions anyway."

Richa stopped him again before he could get away with just that—god, he _needed_ that smoke—a hopeful hand (with the receiver) on his arm. "Yes, okay Mickey, but that's the bit I don't get. How?"

Mickey sighed again, and said, "got to their places on Saturday, and we did the thing there, okay?"

Richa nearly dropped the telephone.

"Look, it's not a big deal," Mickey huffed out, he hoped casually, and backed from her grip, trying to escape from her inquisitive look.

Sure, he'd had to take those sessions on his personal time, but he hadn't been there on Friday to begin with. Okay, he'd had to pay for the transportation from his pocket too.

"Did you get paid for those?"

Yeah, there was also that.

Mickey waved a dismissive, embarrassed hand. "S'not like I could've left them."

"Oh, that wouldn't have tormented many. I can't believe it, Mickey actually has a heart!" She put the receiver on the phone, which made an ancient sound, like it was agonizing, and used her free hand to wipe her forehand, minding not to loosen her grip on her notebook. "Thank you. For both them and me."

"You?"

"You helped me by helping them. You actually saved me a lot of trouble. Changing appointments' time and day is always a total baffle. Thanks, really."

She smiled again and turned around, trying to roll the wire on the floor back to her desk, all serene like Mickey had fucking lit up her day and painted her office with rainbows.

If there was one reason Mickey didn't give up directly on this job, Richa was it.

He caught up with her, a bit sheepish.

"Hey, thanks."

She paused to look at him curiously, over her shoulder, letting him know he'd have to be more a little more specific if he wanted to make himself understood.

Sometimes, rarely, Mickey wished people could read his mind, so that he didn't have to blurt out every words in public.

"For, you know, the advice? Ian?"

Her features softened. "Oh, I'm so glad you're telling me. I didn't have the heart to ask. And it's nothing, really. Is he fine?"

"Yeah. I think so. Think I got him to get back on his treatment," Richa twitched and he urged to add, " _willingly_. Not sure if he's going to attend the rest of his sessions, though, considering...well, considering the current states of things."

It couldn't get more vague, but Richa nodded vigorously, like she understood. "That's great, Mickey," she said slowly and her words kind of _beamed_ exactly the same way her face was beaming.

Mickey fidgeted under her kind aura. A cigarette could wait, after all. He decided to start moving to help her getting the phone back in place, keeping his hands busy. The words flowed out of his mouth before he could really think, but he realized he didn't really mind the spurt of honesty (though he minded the hot wave climbing up his neck at said honesty). "You're doing an alright job, Rich, you know. I know I can be or cause some trouble, but thank you for, y'know, giving me a chance or whatever, for not automatically treating me like shit."

"Wow, thanks?" Richa said with a short laugh, then shrugged, "of course you're worth something. Only goons can't see that. But, you, are not doing an alright job at relationship, though." Her smile only grew wider at Mickey's wince. "But it seems like you got this covered. Ian's lucky he got you."

Fuck, Richa really is the eye in the sky. Mickey rubbed a thumb on his lower lip to hold back the fucking smile that threatened to curl his lips up, like every time Ian was mentioned, and avoided Richa's eyes when she started to chuckle.

He caught a glimpse of Boris in the corridor as he did so, and suddenly, a little light bulb popped up above his head.

He turned to Richa.

"Hey, Rich? Said I helped you with the schedule, yeah?"

"Yes, why?"

"Got something to ask in return."

 

***

 

"Oh hey, that's my little brother here! Thought you didn't live here anymore."

Ian looked up, unimpressed if that was possible. "I'm gonna pretend I didn't hear you, because the amount of irony in this sentence can't be legal."

Lip only shrugged. He'd spend more time at home if he could, but college parties with free booze and drunk teenage girls were too much enjoyment to intentionally get back to the shitshow the house had become since the family started to fall apart.

He did try to improve things, but failure was something he didn't like too much. So, eventually, he got back at what he was doing best; drinking, partying, not-worrying...that sort of things. Only came back home once in a while, for laundry or to watch Liam between two tests.

Ian dropped his duffel bag on the floor and went behind the counter—he'd come by the back door—to grab a cup of coffee. He was practically _whistling_. Lip watched him, eyes up from one of the four physics books spread open on the kitchen table, as Ian planted one hand on the counter, leaned against it, and sipped his coffee.

"What you doin' here?" Ian asked, nodding his head towards the books.

"Proofreading those ten physics books, what do you think?" Lip replied blankly. It seemed to upset his brother, making him all blasé and I-was-just-tryna-be-nice like, so he went for the more classic answer, though the damage was done. "Chad brought his girl to the dorm so it was kind of difficult to concentrate on thermo dynamics. With, you know, all the noise." Ian did that lopsided grimace in mild agreement. "Hey, where's Liam? I'm supposed to watch Liam on Monday afternoons."

"Fiona brought him at the diner I think. Wasn't expecting you'd show up."

"Why wouldn't have I?" Lip questioned, frowning.

Ian shrugged. "You didn't, last week."

He finished the cup and put it in the sink. Lip watched his brother going to his bag, hunching it up his shoulder and climbing the stairs without a word.

"Hey, you okay?" Lip threw over his shoulder.

"Yeah."

Lip eyed the now empty staircase.

Something was up. Ian seemed preoccupied, like someone who has _something in mind_. And alive, too, which was all bizarre after seeing him all those months floating somewhere between life and death.

Lip grabbed a book and an apple to pretend he wasn't just trying to sneak on his brother and followed him up the stairs.

When he found Ian, he was crouched down near his bed, unpacking his bag of dirty clothes and stuffing it with changes, and a few things that were outright suspicious, such as his toothbrush, a pair of glasses and one of gloves Lip had never seen, and the shorts he used as his pajamas.

Lip squinted his eyes at the spectacle. "What happened?"

"Nothing," Ian replied, his nose in his clothes.

"Seems like something happened to me."

Ian's phone buzzed before he could produce an acid reply, and he fumbled with it so fast he nearly dropped it on the floor. Remembering he was not really by himself, he gave Lip a look, but the whistling, the bag, the call? Lip wasn't letting his brother getting away that easily.

"Don't worry," Lip said while munching his apple, hoping on the bunk bed and smiling a smirk he couldn't shake off. "I'm two hundred percent listening."

 _Oh yeah Ian, you can roll your eyes alright._ I _can get nosey alright when something's up with my little brother._

Jesus fuck, nobody tells him anything anymore in this goddamn house.

"Hey Mick."

"Yeah, I'm... yeah."

"No."

"I can't really talk right now," if looks could kill, after the murderous glare his brother sent his way Lip would be spread out dead on the floor now, "but let's talk about that when I get ba—why?"

"Okay, yeah."

"I'll be there."

Whatever answer he got to that must have been hilarious because he chuckled, and Lip could only see the side of his face, but there was a bulge there telling him there was a remaining sign of that. "Fuck you."

"Okay."

"See you," he said softly and hang up, gazing at his phone in wonder before putting it back into his pocket. "Shut up."

Lip smiled around a mouth full of apple. There was so much he could make fun of, yet he couldn't find what to exploit first.

"So _Mick_ happened."

"Fuck off," Ian snapped, already on the defensive.

"Mick in like, Mickey Straits? In like, _love therapy_?"

"Mick in like fuck you, Lip."

Lip jumped off the bed. He approached his brother and landed a hand full of brotherhood on his shoulder.

"Don't get all pissy. I'm not tryna shit on your happiness, man. I just want to know who that is that's making my brother glow like a fucking disney princess."

Ian shook the hand off his shoulder.

"His name's Milkovich."

"Milkovich..." That sounded familiar. Oh yeah, _painfully_ familiar."You mean Milkovich, like a Milkovich boy fresh from the Milkovich factory? _Mickey_ Milkovich? _Wait_ , isn't that the guy who piss—"

"Yeah, yeah."

Lip was hardly listening. "Shit, he was in my year. Not that I ever saw him much." He was lost in his thoughts, trying to get a clear picture of the tiny, dirty Milkovich kid his memory was providing him with. He remembered how Mickey Milkovich used to team up with his brothers—or cousins, shit, Lip couldn't tell, it seemed like they were dozens of Milkoviches as soon as you were trying to avoid them—to bully the better part of the school. He squinted. "So he was gay? Shit, wouldn't have guessed. You have an amazing taste in men."

"Shut up. He's great."

Cute that Ian felt like he had to defend the guy's honor.

Lip felt a pang of envy stinging his esteem, too. Was he being jealous? Probably, yeah. Ian was getting better, and once again it wasn't thanks to him. Lip wasn't there to save the day. So naturally, he was jealous over some dirty neighborhood kid stealing his brother from him.

But he figured that losing the status of hero his brother once gave him long ago, for him to take it back when Lip seriously started to rest on it, was still better than losing said brother for good. A thing he really thought would happen after the disaster of Ian running away.

His brother's happiness was worth any shitty brother-in-law.

He sat on Ian's bed, the latter still eyeing him suspiciously, and kicked him in the calf. "Shouldn't you meet up with the guy? You're distracting me from Grandy's _Entropy and the Time Evolution of Macroscopic Systems_ ' great teachings."

His brother stared at him dumbly. "You do understand these things?"

Lip smiled. "Not a word."

 

***

 

"Ian," Mandy suddenly claimed, turning to the redhead and swaying a little, "I give you my benediction. You may take my brother's hand and all that sappy shit."

They were waiting for the bus taking Mandy to Indiana to start up, outside in the dark night. There were kind of chills in the air, causing Mickey to curl a little closer to Ian with his massive coat that made him look like a grey bear, and Ian sure wasn't complaining about any of it. Mickey, though, already had the time to grumpily complain twenty times or so about having to wait (it wasn't making him any less cuter) (thank god Mickey couldn't read his thoughts). They were a little light-headed, a little drunk and a little high; because if Gallaghers know how to party, Milkoviches sure as shit aren't far away behind.

Mandy grabbed both of their right hands and joined them while humming a wedding song, and Ian burst out laughing, while Mickey was left shaking his head in disbelieve.

"Ay, don't I got a say in this?"

"Come on, Mick, you're all marshmallow-like when you're with him, it's so fucking gross. All soft an' shit. You too, Ian. You're both so disgusting it's disgusting. Plus, now you get to marry in _every fucking state_ you want; ain't that magic? Now shut up and kiss your boyfriend already."

"Come on, shut up, Mands. You're so drunk they won't even let you get up in that damn bus."

"Shut your face, yes they will. Their trip would be so boring without me," she snapped.

As if on cue, they saw the driver making his way towards them. She smacked a quick kiss on Ian's cheek, hugging him tight. The siblings looked at each other in feigned disgust, and flicked each other at the same time. Ian saw from the corner of his eye the both of them smiling when Mandy turned around to finally hop on the bus.

They watched her clowning from her seat on the bus, effectively making the young woman sitting next to her, on the window's side, very uncomfortable, as the old vehicle was finally leaving the station.

"You sister's cool," he told Mickey once the bus was completely out of sight.

"She's alright," Mickey conceded with a smile.

Ian knocked their shoulders together playfully. "Heard that? I'm entitled to ask for your hand now. Got her benediction and all," he said with a grin and Mickey sighed, but lightly, in a I'm-just-pretending-to-be-annoyed way.

Unable to resist the urge, Ian rapidly glanced at the surroundings. Everything was dark and desert. He tilted Mickey's chin back to press their lips together. Mickey allowed it, kissing back in a way that made Ian's heart thud so hard it'd almost hurt if it didn't feel so good.

They parted in a daze and Mickey risked a quick kiss. "Yeah, well, that'll have to wait, Firecrotch." Ian nearly chocked himself in his laughter at the nickname. "I have to show you something first."

"You taking me to a nice restaurant?"

Mickey snorted, shaking his head. "Are you serious? We ate like three entire pizzas each."

Ian's stomach growled painfully at the unpleasant memory. "Yeah, maybe not the best idea."

Mickey held out his hand, for Ian to take, and Ian stared at it, blank of all emotion. It seemed too perfect to be real.

"C'mon."

Ian scanned him suspiciously.

When Mickey waved impatiently in his direction, his cheeks a little brighter than usual, he thought it might not be a trap after all, and held out his own hand, closed it around Mickey's smaller one, squeezing a bit tighter than necessary, daring Mickey to change his mind, to take it off.

But Mickey didn't, and there they were, holding hands in the middle of the street, and even though it was desert and so dark no one would've even guessed they were there, it felt like a massive achievement.

Mickey led him through the streets, silent, until Ian recognized the path they were taking.

"No, you did not..." he breathed, then sent a disbelieving glance Mickey's way. "But you can't?"

"Had to pull a few strings. And hey, that's what makes it so fascinating too, yeah?"

Ian really did make a effort not to laugh at the hand-holding dork.

They made their way to the free clinic. Ian kind of felt like a secret agent when they climbed the emergency stairs, at the back, but the magic partially faded away when Mickey let go of his hand to unbolt the entrance, then to type the code on the alarm so it didn't ring. But then, his hand went mechanically back inside Ian's, and the riot of color was back on track.

Inside, a noise that, oddly, sounded familiar to Ian's hears had them freezing right away. Mickey took an abrupt turn to the left, securing them right against the wall with Ian behind him, sliding silently to the waiting room door, and kicked the ajar door softly.

"Oh, that's just Lady Olivia," he said, and grabbed Ian's hand back, like it was enough of an explanation.

"What the fuck? Who's Lady Olivia?" Ian peeked, bewildered, inside the room. He saw the old lady whose snoring he had mistaken with the air conditioner. " _She_ 's Lady Olivia?"

"Yeah. So you comin' or what?"

"Don't act all impatient and stuff, shouldn't we wake her up or something?"

"Nah, Lady Olivia sleeping here is a commonly accepted fact. I tried to wake her up a few times, but, trust me, she's a heavy sleeper. She did that during a session, too. Man, what an exhausting day."

But Ian was still suspicious.

"Listen, don't worry about it. Even if you decided to tie me down on that chair next to her and make me scream, she probably wouldn't wake up."

Ian eyed him up curiously.

"Hey, don't give me that look, you perv," he laughed. "The rest of the department would turn up." He gave him a quick, cocky look up and down. "Plus, that's creepy, man."

"So we're just gonna let her here?"

Mickey shrugged. "Yeah. I mean, she says those chairs are more comfy than hers, and she can't lie down. She knows how to unset the alarm, and does it most nights, so what I do, man? Been doing this for years, apparently. It's a thing."

Ian nodded. He wondered how here could be where this old lady slept best.

He used to make nightmares about this clinic.

As if on cue, Mickey shook him out of his dark thoughts. "C'mere." He dragged him in front of his office, with Pisario's office door wide open. Ian had already been in Dr Pisario's office, but what he saw when he stepped inside of his office was nothing like he remembered.

Then, he'd never attended a session with him at night, with the curtains open, and no light.

"Damn, Mick."

There was quite a view. The night was clear and the moon reflected a bluey light on the buildings, in its last quarter. There were dots of lights in the distance, from both windows and various sources of enjoyment, and the uninterrupted flow of cars had the streets nearly glittering in the dark.

"Gotta admit, Chicago looks pretty cool when you're one of the lucky fuckers in the center with their big, tall houses."

"Yeah. I get the goddamn wall when this dickhead gets this."

The look Ian had on the outside drifted back inside the room. There was quite a setup too. It wasn't the romantic date some couples have, but it had its spice. With a bottle of jack on the floor, along with multiples of beers and bottles of water, Ian almost wanted to ask Mickey if he was expecting a few people to join.

(Almost, because that also meant he couldn't keep Mickey for himself.)

He couldn't help his grin when he noticed the mattress in front of the bay window.

"Obviously we don't wanna keep _this_ session PG," Ian said and Mickey looked both amused and annoyed by the reference. "Romantic date at work?"

"I pictured it more like your chance to send a big fuck you, literally, to all the times you had to come here, actually," Mickey explained. One thing Ian could tick off his bucket list now. "But now that we're here, yeah, you might as well pay me for working overtime. I accept nature payments," he said with a grin and Ian rolled his eyes.

"Shit, should have brought the glasses and gloves," Ian said. Role-play sounded hot.

"Thank god you didn't." Mickey set his backpack to his feet and nodded at the room, "so desk, mattress, wall, chair, library? You pick one."

"When did you do that, though? You've been with us all day."

"I can't reveal the identity of my partner in crime, but her name starts with Rich, ends with -a, has curly, black hair, and is the tiniest human in existence."

"Oh, I believe you're mistaken. I'm your partner in crime."

He practically _heard_ Mickey roll his eyes.

"What 'bout the window?"

Mickey scoffed. "The window?"

Ian nodded eagerly.

"Alright, alright."

Mickey walked towards the window and started undoing his pants, his rhythm steady, and Ian wasn't quite sure whether it was just supposed to be Mickey taking his clothes off, or Mickey _stripping_ for him. There was no music, but the effort was there.

Once Mickey was completely naked except for his boxers, he braced his elbows around his head, shoulder blades showing dangerously, against the window.

When there was no sound suggesting he was getting joined any time soon, he glanced over his shoulder, only to see an amazed Ian, who hadn't moved from an inch, stuck where he left him with his jaw hanging a little and his eyes wide.

"Are you broken? Are you plannin' on staring forever?"

"Yeah," Ian replied in all honesty and Mickey's cheeks might have flushed a little bit. He turned his head to the window too quickly for Ian to really tell, though.

"There's better, you can touch too."

"I can?" Ian asked, his voice dripping from irony.

"Shithead."

Ian walked slowly towards Mickey, taking the invitation but savoring this moment of seeing a naked Mickey waiting for him in front of the Chicago skyline. It wasn't fair that Mickey was the only one almost butt-naked, so Ian waited for him to turn around and nearly jumped out of his own clothes.

It was funny how perfect Mickey's skin was. The whitish-bluish of the moon reverberated against the side of his body in the most perfect way, following the curved line of his body, his muscles protruding.

Ian let his hand trail down that perfect skin, perfect back, perfect being. He hunched over him, enveloping him with his own body, protecting him even, and his mouth slid, a contact rather than a kiss, all the way down to the small of his back in one smooth motion, following his spine as he plopped down on his knees. He yanked the boxers down.

Probably expecting to be blown at this point, Mickey tried to turn round, only for Ian to grab him still, murmuring a simple "don't" that left Mickey at sea.

"What're you— _fuck,_ " he managed to say before his head dropped between his shoulders as Ian blew air in between his legs and licked one fat line between his ass cheeks. Then, a second, and Mickey swore again.

Ian backed off. "You don't like it?"

(He was just being a little shit, obviously. But he wanted to hear Mickey to say it, to admit that yeah, Ian was making him feel good.)

Mickey mumbled something, but when he understood that Ian was not about to keep doing whatever he started on that Mickey didn't want to think about until he got an answer, he looked over his shoulder.

"I'm not sayin' it, asswipe."

"Oh, too bad," Ian began and made as if to stand up.

That had Mickey changing tactics real quick. "Yeah okay okay, alright, don't stop. I like it, okay? ...don't stop," he confessed quickly, and this time Ian could see his cheeks, in the moonlight, and they were definitely red. "You happy now?"

Oh yes, Ian was satisfied. "Yes, very."

He went back to Mickey's ass, ignoring the displeased grunt that followed his attitude the moment it turned into a soft, muffled whimper.

He slid his tongue around the circle of muscles, his hands caressing his ass cheeks softly, until he spread him out and shoved that tongue inside of him.

"Shit, Ian!" Mickey arched back, his ass jerking backwards into Ian's face, making him nuzzle Mickey's crack.

Now that he had a good hold on Mickey, Ian licked more firmly, grabbing both hips to eat him out more conveniently and effectively, stretching him, filling him with his tongue that he tried and made the hardest he could as he pushed it in and out, fingers joining.

Mickey's right hand left the glass and wandered around. Ian caught it and landed it into his hair, loving the way Mickey directly accommodated to the new position, twisting his hand in Ian's hair and pushing him with breathy, barely understandable pleas.

Ian didn't know it could be enjoyable for him, but he found himself loving to rim Mickey. He loved it so much he started to jerk himself off without even realizing it.

"Ian, come on _Ian_ ," Mickey pleaded above him.

Ian wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

"What do you want?" he asked.

"You can't finish me like that. Fuck me, yeah?" Mickey started and turned around to search Ian's face, like he was looking for his consent, his cheeks flushed and his breath uneven, "I want you to fuck me, Ian."

Obviously, the consent was there. Ian turned around to dig in Mickey's backpack.

"Shit," he said, holding his breath. "Shit, shit _shit_."

"What?"

"The lube. I can't find it. There's no condom either. Did you—"

"Oh, fuck... Mandy came in the room when I was stuffing the bag and I didn't want her to say I'm gross or whatever so I thought I'd do it later but then later you came along and we were high and w—"

Ian let go of the stupid, useless bag to turn a disbelieving eye towards Mickey. "Why d'you care about what Mandy will say? She's obviously cool with us."

"Can you please not bring my sister in the conversation when we're about to have sex?"

"Hey, _you_ mentioned her!" Oh, Mickey was just fucking with him, judging by his grin. Ian smiled too, but felt a little devastated by their night's outcome. Though they still had the jack and beers. "And we're not gonna have sex anyway. At least not like that."

"Hey, what?"

Ian sighed. "I don't wanna hurt you, Mick. Without lube it's not gonna be good and I want you to feel good, plus we don't have a condom anyway, so we're gonna have to figure out a way to—"

Mickey dropped to his knees and took Ian in his mouth.

Ian shuddered violently, holding the slippy window frame for good mercy.

The city lights on the other site of the glass went all blurry, dancing around like wild, voyeuristic leprechauns, mocking Ian for falling for his own game. Maybe Ian moaned a little, just to give him the satisfaction.

Mickey did an amazing job at pouring saliva all over Ian's cock, on the head, then on the underside, then on the whole thing, up and down, and it shouldn't be as hot as he looked but when he eventually pulled out (minding not to make Ian come), Ian was seriously shaken by the display.

Mickey got up and faced the window again.

Ian chuckled, but it came out breathier than expected. "You do know what you want, don't you?"

"Don't _you_?"

"I do."

Ian fingered Mickey a few more times, just to be sure. "You tell me if that hurts. I'm serious."

He circled Mickey's shoulders with his arms and enveloped him, breathing in his neck and kissing him there, then biting him in the same spot, distracting him as he hitched his hips forward, until they were locked together.

"Wish your dick was as big as your talk," Mickey breathed.

"My dick's pretty big though."

He ran his hands on Mickey's abdomen and he rolled his hips, once, against Mickey.

"Yeah, your dick is pretty big," Mickey admitted with a breathy laugh and a smile that was driving Ian crazy. When Ian wasn't moving roughly enough, he tried to use his leverage on the window to fuck himself back onto Ian's dick.

Ian would've liked to keep the tease on a bit longer, but he needed to comply. For his own good. He nipped at Mickey's earlobe and did as he was told.

" _Shit, you feel so good._ "

Somewhere into the nine minute mark, Ian reached out to jerk Mickey off, who hadn't touched himself from the start, letting him come against the window with a moan.

Ian felt really close too, so close it was becoming dangerous. Fighting against his devouring wish to just come in Mickey's tight warmth, he started to pull out, but Mickey held his waist from behind.

The tickle in Ian's stomach was there. He gathered all his willpower to warn Mickey urgently, in case he forgot. "Mick, I don't—"

"I know," he cut him off, his voice coming out as a broken murmur, "just come inside me already."

 _Fuck_.

He'd taken regular tests. He had had to, for his very first sessions, and he kept doing them after that, because it was free and he wasn't carefree enough not to care about this stuff. Especially when he was just fucking around. Which was what he mostly ever did.

 _Fuck._ It was his first time at barebacking.

"I really don't, like—have anything, I'm clean," he panted, breathless. "For real."

"Ian, come on..."

Ian rested his forehead against Mickey's sweaty back, rolled his hips against him, getting back to their previous pace, until his muscles gave away and he did as he was told, his come splashing in Mickey's ass and his arms holding him tight as though he was the only thing that could secure him left.

He was, really.

 

***

 

"So, how you feeling, Ian Gallagher?"

Incredulous, Ian turned his head to Mickey.

They were both spread out on the mattress, and Ian was still a bit shaken by the idea that Mickey had his jizz up his butt just a few minutes ago, as if a silent pact had been concluded between the two of them the moment Ian's sperm spurted out and soiled Mickey.

Ian felt like a creep that the picture made him think about Mandy's mention of marriage.

Naturally, in his creepy state of contentment, he was slightly taken aback by the notorious question. Thankfully Mickey didn't make it sound as bad as he may have been hearing it before, under other circumstances.

"Oh so this was all a trap?"

He felt his sly pleasantry fell flat as Mickey stared right back at him askance. He raised two hands in surrender.

"Alright, okay. I'm good. I'm good, man."

Mickey flashed a smile (tried to cover it by rubbing his lip, but too late, _Ian had seen it_ ). "First time I hear you say that."

"First time I feel like that, too. In months. How about you, Mickey Milkovich? We never get to know about the ones who work in the shadow. How you feeling?"

"A little high, honestly," he confessed with a guilty smile, "But other than that, I'm fine."

"Oh yes, you sir are a fine man."

Even high, Mickey couldn't apparently deal with this amount of lameness because he grunted and punched (a little limply but Ian couldn't blame him his legs felt like cotton too) Ian in the arm.

Ian caught his hand mid-air in his left palm and ran his fingers on Mickey's knuckles. He couldn't decide which one he liked the most between the sexy mob-look and the hot tattooed-bad-boy one. He'd rather let mankind burn in hell than answer this question.

"What the fuck are you doing?"

"Thought you were supposed to unfuck me up?"

Mickey looked down at his tattoos and scowled. "Oh, yeah, that," he muttered, as if he had forgotten the existence of the huge, capital letters telling everyone he would FUCK U-UP if you tried to mess with him. (Was it possible, to ever forget that, really?) "Rich had me wearing the gloves to cover 'em up. Not much of a selling point in the business, you know."

"Must be a burden to find a job, too. How do you do during job interviews, cover your hands with your ass?"

"Yeah? Smartass, you wouldn't guess what nice office work those knuckles found."

"I bet those knuckles wearing their nice office clothes must be hot during sex."

That had Mickey groaning (and smiling; _Ian saw it too_ ). "Quit the role-play shit, will you?"

Ian giggled dumbly. Really, they should role-play sometime. He had still time to get Mickey on the same boat as him. "I can't understand the coworkers for having you covering them up, though. Those tats are kind of sexy."

"Make me look like a lout," Mickey grumbled.

"A lout?" Ian couldn't bite back the laugh. "It's okay. I'd guessed you were a thug," he whispered softly, nodding knowingly. "My personal sexy thug."

Mickey knit his eyebrow and Ian ended up laughing like a loon, until Mickey couldn't hold his own laughter back any longer, making it clear though, by punching Ian in the same exact spot than before, that it wasn't in _any way_ because he was Ian's personal sexy thug.

"Got something for you," he said, sitting straight and fumbling in his backpack.

Curious, Ian propped himself up on his elbow. Mickey then waved a clock around like it was the elf guy from Debbie's video game brandishing the Triforce. Ian would have made fun of him, but the clock, oddly familiar, held his attention.

"I can't believe it," Ian said slowly when it clicked together. He took the device the eyebrow-wiggling Mickey was offering him. Looking from the clock's every angle, between his palms, he couldn't help but laugh. "You didn't bring condoms, but you did bring that?"

"Fuck you, you didn't bring condoms either, and you're the one stickin' it up my ass."

Ian nodded sheepishly. "Fair enough."

"Said I'd fix it up, didn't I?"

Ian's eyes trailed down Mickey hands, tattooed knuckles. He wished he could be fixed by those magic hands, that'll maybe enable him to do something with his own for once, and not let his siblings think he was going to slit his wrists over Thanksgiving like their mother did.

"Thanks."

And he meant it.

It wasn't just the clock, it was everything.

Between his words and his body, though, his body had always been the most honest. He rolled completely so he could be on top of Mickey, and worked on sucking blood up to the surface, near his collarbone.

"Thanks."

It didn't take long before they were joined together again, this time on the mattress because although the rest of the furniture did sound hot as hell, Ian doubted his legs could uphold him much longer. Mickey was riding him nice and slow, their hands locked above Ian's head, on top of the mattress, and when Ian wasn't chasing after his lips, Mickey made sure to bend over conveniently so they could pant in each other's mouth whenever they pleased.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> DISCLAIMER: Ian and Mickey are ignorant pricks who didn't listen during sex-ed classes (or simply ditched them). I think you know about this but I'll still say it, just to be on the safe side: pulling out before coming doesn't mean you or your partner are safe. That's unprotected sex and that's dangerous. Don't do that. Safe is sexy.
> 
> I'm rewatching shameless and it's kind of amazing. I mean, since season 5 set my standards so low, I'm almost surprised to rediscover how actually good the show used to be. If you still feel (very) bitter about season 5, I highly recommend you go watch from the first season (then when you get to the fifth, I don't know)
> 
> Also, if you feel ever bad, remember that Mickey beat the shit out of Lip in 01x03


	9. epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maybe Ian had indeed been broken, at some point. Maybe he just needed the missing piece that'd fix him, then. And though Mother Nature can be a hell of a bitch sometimes, she did provide him with that missing piece, Mickey fucking Milkovich. Sure, that didn't make things any easier, but it did make them a lot more bearable, and now that he knew what he wanted, for both him and them, Ian intended on working hard on it.

It took more than just a few days for the doctors to find out the right combination for Ian's cocktail.

In the meanwhile, he felt so, _so_ irritable, edgy, and tired by the smallest things, _all the time_. It was hard to get off the bed. Going up the stairs felt like climbing up the Everest.

_We'll do this together. I'll be with you._

Mickey didn't forget his promise. He was visiting him, almost every day. Texted or called when he couldn't. Slept over sometimes, a reassuring warmth pressed against Ian's stomach. No matter how awfully pale, no matter how much of bad company Ian was, Mickey just kept visiting him.

Everyone was trying hard, Ian could tell much. Monica was hardly mentioned in the house anymore, for starters, and even Lip was holding back smartass comments about Mickey, even though it was obvious that the two of them couldn't bear each other.

Mickey unexpectedly bonded with the youngest Gallaghers, though. It was adorable to see how excited they all grew when Mickey was supposed to come over; as soon as they heard a knock on the door, they almost jumped out of their skin and dashed to the door, flooding him with questions and game requests. Mickey complied only grudgingly at first, but it seemed to Ian that he ended up falling for the badass big brother role. Ian was glad Mickey found something else to do than to just sit next to him when, plied with meds, Ian was vegetating.

The taking care thing seemed to be unknown territory for Mickey. He tried not to crowd Ian's space, but at the same time, he was there for his every needs. It felt suffocating at times, but mostly, it felt really, really reassuring. It felt safe.

Truthfully, Mickey's presence was enough. He could've backed off anytime he wanted, yet he still was there. And it wasn't for the looks, obviously, because Ian looked like a zombie, _at best._ There wasn't any words to translate how grateful Ian felt. He was just _so_ grateful. It had him to _do his share_ , words from the therapy group he was now attending.

As if on cue, everything started to get better the day Mickey's dad got arrested for some too greedy, too stupid drug deal that went wrong. The police had been trying to nab him for fucking ever, to throw him in jail and keep him there, so, as it would appear, he was locked up in there for a little while.

The very day Mickey told Ian that over the phone, Ian gathered his courage and made it to Mickey's house, his first time out since the beginning of the treatment, and he didn't make it back home. He just stayed at Mickey's.

And the new cocktail seemed to work. He got better. Although he was still out of it most of the time, things didn't seem so glum, so hopeless anymore.

Ian and Mickey would spend so much time together, inside and outside the house, that the brothers started to get suspicious, even though public touching was completely out of question—Ian remained too conscious of the whole homophobic aura floating in the Milkovich house; he didn't want to put Mickey in a delicate situation with his brothers. He made it as if he were just The Annoying Friend Looking For A Mattress.

But they grew so comfortable with each other that before they realized it, they were smiling at each other, sending each other meaningful, cocky looks, outside the bedroom too, and that, Ian wasn't even noticing anymore.

It didn't escape everyone's notice. Iggy asked first, after Ian and Mickey came out of the bathroom together, with only a towel around their waists, thinking they were alone in the house. All the brothers were actually lazing in the living-room, watching TV and shit talking. Iggy twisted his body in the couch, so he could take them in, and scoffed, "are you guys fucking or some shit?"

Ian stiffened next to Mickey, who didn't seem shaken _at all_.

"That, plus other things, too," he shrugged.

While both Ian's and Iggy's jaws slackened, Colin, sitting in the corner, simply said, "You're so gonna get killed for that."

That night, Ian pulled Mickey in the bedroom and kissed him _so hard_ on the mouth, that he saw stars. Straddled by Ian who was fucking him hard into the mattress, their plastered bodies and intertwined fingers slippy with sweat, Mickey wondered why in hell hadn't he done that before.

Turned out, Mickey didn't get killed for it. Though he never came out publicly, the word rapidly spread around the whole neighborhood that the youngest Milkovich son was a fag, and a few thought that entitled them to knock down his door and give him a piece of their minds, but Mickey sent enough of them home with a black eye for everyone to get the message, that being gay wasn't making Mickey Milkovich any softer. At some point, they simply stopped trying.

Joey was the only one out of the brothers to take the news quite bad, leaving the room with a disgusted grunt whenever he saw them together. Ian kept apologizing, to the point where Mickey told him he didn't care about his brother because he just wanted to be with Ian, and if Joey couldn't accept that, he could just go fuck himself. Joey did get used to it, at some point, though, and the brothers were a bit weird with one another until they weren't anymore.

Boris and Mickey fought a bit harder than usual one day at the clinic, and despite Richa's intervention in Mickey's favor, he was thrown out. Mickey told Richa not to worry because he wasn't cut out for this shit anyway, but she argued that he could do a great job if he gave himself the means to. She talked about setting up a meeting with the medical team to try and land a diploma as a nurse-aid or some shit.

He did argue it was a stupid idea, for a Milkovich shit of a son to have something as absurdly abstract as a diploma, but Ian had glitters in his eyes, so enthusiastic about the whole damn thing, that Mickey gave in, secretly hoping to make him proud—that decision earned Mickey yet another fuck he knew he wasn't about to forget, Ian's muscled arms wrapped around him as he was forgetting how to breathe.

It consisted in a written exam and a practical test, and Mickey nailed the first but pretended any dumb shit could've gotten through. (Once at home, Ian looked up rapidly on the internet, and couldn't even get a quarter of the answers right. Maybe he was worse than any dumb shit, but his bet would rather be on Mickey working real hard on it, and he really didn't know when because they were together almost all the time. He must have been a burden on Mickey's sleeping schedule.)

The day of the practical test, Mickey was practically vibrating of stress. Ian had never seen Mickey so stressed out about anything ever, and apparently, neither had his brothers.

Ian squeezed the older man's hand in his own, whispering encouraging words in his ear the entire ride in the L. Mickey had argued that he shouldn't come, saying he probably had other more interesting shit to do on his own—but Ian knew it was because he dreaded failing in front of him.

"You're gonna do great," he said, squeezing Mickey's hand in his lap.

"The hopes you're placing in me are gonna make me fail," but Mickey's eyes were pleading Ian to keep up with the encouragement.

"What are you sayin'?" Ian chuckled, "I don't have any expectations."

His tone was soft and the tease obvious in his voice, but Mickey's head fell between his shoulders, sheepish, so Ian planted a kiss on his temple and urged him to put his head on his shoulder. Mickey allowed it, secretly grateful. It was a Saturday morning and sure, the L was almost empty, but they were in a public place anyway, and Ian couldn't help but take this as a win.

The hour and a half Ian had to wait in front of the clinic had got to be the most stressful hour and a half he ever encountered, and he was not even the one taking the fucking test. At some point, Mickey appeared through the clinic's door, said something to the nurses there before looking around for Ian.

Ian stood up, alert as shit, but he didn't know whether he was supposed to ask if it went alright, shit, he didn't even know if Mickey knew as of right now or if they had to wait for some fucking paper in the mail, but before he could make a decision, Mickey was shuffling along, his face wrecked, and Ian didn't know if that was happiness-wreck or failure-wreck, but then Mickey blurted out, "I passed," waving tiredly some kind a certificate in front of him, and next thing, Ian was knocking the air out of him with a kiss, and a passionate one that is.

Mickey clutched at his shoulders, overall being a cute squeezed mess in Ian's arms.

"I'm so fucking proud," Ian whispered in the crook of Mickey's neck, like he always did.

"It's just some fucking nurse shit. Maybe I'll just sort files out."

"Not you won't," Ian replied, "Richa said you'll have to deal with the patients directly."

"Yeah," Mickey admitted lowly. He was trying to play it cool, but Ian could see how proud he felt and hell, honestly, he felt fifty thousand times prouder. "Thanks for coming."

Ian just couldn't wait to get home and kiss the shit out of him, to show him just how fucking perfect he was.

They made it back to the Milkovich house, and by the time they were inside, Ian was thankful to see they were alone, because he couldn't have kept his hands off Mickey any fucking longer. Tugging at his shirt impatiently, he pulled him into his bedroom. They ended up fucking not even ten minutes later, Mickey riding Ian hard into the mattress, both of them taking a great delight in the moans each other weren't even trying to hold back.

Mickey was so beautiful when he was riding him that Ian couldn't help reaching out for his face, wrapping his fingers around his neck, praising him in a way that kept him going even harder, until they came, almost at the same second, swearing and crying each other's name out in each other's mouths.

"I never doubted you could do it, you know," Ian confessed once they'd caught their breath, sprawled onto the mattress.

"I should've failed just to prove you wrong."

Ian shoved him on the shoulder, climbed on top of him and slipped his tongue along the corner of Mickey's mouth, kissing him slow and nice; with all he had, really.

Maybe Ian had indeed been broken, at some point. Maybe he just needed the missing piece that'd fix him, then. And though Mother Nature can be a hell of a bitch sometimes, she did provide him with that missing piece, Mickey fucking Milkovich. Sure, that didn't make things any easier, but it did make them a lot more bearable, and now that he knew what he wanted, for both him and them, Ian intended on working hard on it.

And as Mickey was whispering how much he loved him, in his tiny bedroom, their eyes locked together, and as Ian was fucking him slowly enough that none of them would ever be able to forget each other's taste ever, broken or not, Ian couldn't complain about the way things had turned out to be.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, dear lord. We did it. We actually did it.
> 
> Thank you so much, that was chaotic as hell, but you still stuck up till the end. I really hope you enjoyed reading through it. Of course, my [inbox](http://wheres-mickey.tumblr.com/ask) is always open for a prompt, or a chat! I really can't thank you enough.


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